Healthy Heroes: A Story of Perseverance

By Scott Ratcliffe Daily Progress correspondent
Published: August 26, 2008

Prior to her 40th birthday just over a year ago, Lenai Banks paid her doctor a visit for a baseline mammogram. The news was not good.

She learned that she would have to undergo a double mastectomy. It would be her second bout with cancer, having beaten the disease as a child, at the time not knowing whether she would live to see 21.

Banks’ troubles didn’t stop there, either. In March, she was diagnosed as having diabetes.

Many people would likely lose control, ask why so many bad things happened to them, slip into depression or complain.

Not Lenai Banks.

She decided to start exercising, eat better and make her best effort to live a long, healthy life.

For her ability to overcome such adversity and initiate such a tough turn-around, while in the process inspiring and encouraging others, Banks was named the winner of this year’s Healthy Heroes Award, sponsored by The Daily Progress and The Ragged Mountain Running Shop.

The annual award recognizes local people who have improved their lives through athletics.

“I really had to kick it in gear and get myself together,” Banks said. With the support of her family, friends and co-workers at Sperry Marine, where she works as a senior associate engineer, Banks knew she had to make a life-changing decision. When informed of the diabetes, Banks was even more inclined to make a change.

With her father already dealing with diabetes, Banks did not want to share his need to inject himself with insulin.

“Either get up off the couch and do what I’m supposed to do or I’ll be shooting needles in me, and that wasn’t really a choice,” Banks said. “In my lifetime I’ve had enough of needles and doctors. I’ve had good doctors, great doctors, but I’d rather see them in the store to say hello.”

Getting into shape

Admittedly out of shape, she joined the Women’s Four Miler training program at Lake Monticello, something she wouldn’t have even considered prior to the news of her newfound health issues. The three-month program is designed to help women get in shape by conquering the challenge of a four-mile run, as well as to fund research to fight breast cancer at the University of Virginia’s Breast Care Center, where Banks underwent her own surgery and recovery.

Her initial reasoning for joining was not only to help get in shape and lose weight, but also to do her part to reward the center for helping give her another chance.

“My thinking was, ‘Well, UVa helped save my life this time, and that’s the least I can do to give back,’” said Banks. “Then the journey just took this whole other turn, where I met women out there who were out there just because. They hadn’t had cancer, they knew somebody or they worked with people who have it, and I just thought that was amazing. That inspired me to really kick it up a notch, to take care of myself a little better, and I realized that to me, the cancer was a blessing in disguise I guess, because I really believe that when it’s your time to go, you’re gonna go. Whether you’re overweight, underweight, you’re going when it’s time.”

Done with the excuses

It dawned on her that it didn’t make sense for her to live miserably while she was here, to be unable to do such things as be active with her children. She was done with making excuses that she was too tired or didn’t want to move, and that’s what really spurred her alteration.

Getting started wasn’t easy for Banks, even though her friend who told her about the training program assured her that she would fit in, whether she walked, ran, or even crawled. The idea is to go at your own pace and build up as much as you can over the three-month session prior to the race, which is set for this Saturday. Somewhat reluctant, Banks agreed to give it a try.

“I was afraid to start because I knew how out of shape I was, and I’m not exaggerating, for me to walk 50 feet was hard,” she said. “I hated to walk, I hated to get up, it just tired me. I remember the first night we went out, it was a quarter of a mile and I thought I was going to die. It was just rough.”

Thinking she wouldn’t get through it, Banks flirted with the thought of quitting, but she said that the other women in her group, as well as her two teenage daughters, helped dispel that notion. Realizing that she’d have to start slowly, in her free time at home she began walking two houses away from hers and back, then three houses and back.

Making good progress

Now 10 weeks later, Banks is up to three miles fairly comfortably, and is improving with each day, even doing two miles around her neighborhood on her off days. She used to just walk, but now she jogs a little and just recently began to run, admitting that it’s a great feeling and sense of accomplishment to have come as far as she has.

Banks gives most of the credit for her transformation to her daughters, 14-year-old Michaela and 11-year-old Marina, who have been by her side every step of the way during the group’s Saturday sessions.

“They’re runners, but they won’t leave my side,” Banks said. “They walk with me the whole time and just keep me going and keep me motivated. A lot of times while we’re on the track I’ll say, ‘Girls, go ahead and run, I know you want to run,’ and they’ll say, ‘No we don’t, we just want to walk with you,’ and they’ve just been excellent.”

On the days when she walks around her neighborhood, Banks said, Michaela and Marina are cheering her on each time she makes a lap around the block, and encouraging their friends to do the same. She also acknowledges her fellow runners in the program for sticking by her through the summer, saying she doesn’t know what they see in her because she admits that she’s been the slowest in the group since day one.

An example to others

However, fellow program member Vickie Hines explained that Banks has been an example to them.

Hines moved from Kinston, N.C., to Lake Monticello at the end of June and joined the program in early July. She said Banks has inspired her to make a change in her own life. Hines nominated Banks for the award.

“She thanked all of us for keeping her going, but it is she who keeps me going,” Hines said. “She has been my motivation to start running again. Not only has she battled cancer, but she is out there every night pushing forward for such a great cause. I have nothing to complain about in the evenings except that it is hot, but she never complains. She motivates me to get out there and off the couch.”

As a result of her hard work and determination, Banks has noticed a dramatic change in her health and appearance, as she has lost 50 pounds since her surgery in September, about 15 since joining the training program, and this summer received much better news in a follow-up visit to her doctor. She learned that her blood sugar and cholesterol numbers were down considerably.

“It was really wonderful to know that all that I had been doing was not in vain,” she said.

Banks has no intentions of giving up her new hobby of walking and running, as Sperry is conducting a Health Walk in which employees are to report how many times they are going to walk a week as well as how far. Banks admits that she doesn’t necessarily need the extra encouragement, but explained that this way, she will continue with her exercise and in a way be held accountable for it. She insists that in order to make a similar transformation, all you have to do is get past the initial hurdle of getting out and making an effort.

“Just start, a little at a time,” she said. “My thinking used to be, ‘I can’t walk a mile, so I’m not going to walk.’ Wrong answer. No, I can’t walk a mile, but I can walk two houses and back, and if I did that every day, then I can walk three houses, and that’s exactly what I did.

“You don’t have to jump in and think you’re going to be a marathon runner, you just have to start. I used to hate walking and now I’m just like, ‘I need to go for my walk, I can’t wait.’ And it does become addictive.”

The three finalists for the award were selected by a panel of judges: Ragged Mountain Running Shop owner Mark Lorenzoni; Daily Progress Sports Editor Jerry Ratcliffe; Dr. Bob Wilder; and Baker Butler Elementary School physical education teacher Kathy Thomas, two-time winner of both the Charlottesville Ten Miler and the Richmond Marathon.