Copyright PRINCE GEORGE CITIZEN 2005)
Taking the long road to recovery
Former P.G. resident survives near - death experience to become ultra - marathon man
by IAN MACINTYRE
CanWest News Service
Run, Logan, run.
Run down dusty, ranch roads and up narrow, steep mountain trails. Run through
forests and icy streams, and keep going over deadwood and around rocks, climbing
above the tree line. Then run farther.
Run because every step is a celebration of your life -- your spirit -- because
every stride takes you farther from that terrible day 17 years ago. Run because
you can.
Run, Logan Beaulieu, because running saved you and others need to know.
"My grandmother told me: 'Be careful how you live because you may be the
only bible someone ever reads,"' says Moe Beaulieu, Logan's dad. "In
some ways, Logan says he's better off because of the accident -- in the way he
looks at life."
The accident is later. First comes Logan. At 33, the Edmonton resident is among
Canada's premier ultra-marathoners, which is difficult to quantify because the
sport is loosely organized and even among extreme athletes, ultra runners are
considered chief tenants of the lunatic fringe. Truly and figuratively, they are
out there.
They race on wilderness courses up to 160 kilometres or more in length, often
climbing 2,400 metres or 3,000 metres during a race. They carry their own water
and energy food and must be somewhat self- sufficient because if they get into
trouble, aid stations may be long distances apart. There is no prize money, no
fame, no X-Games.
"Training is not always that fun, but the events are like a rebirth,"
Moe, 60, explains. "It's like you're a child again, running in the woods.
"I don't tell a lot of people about it because they figure: This guy's
lying or he's insane. Then after they get to know me, they think: He's not
lying, he's just insane. Why would you run 100 miles? Because you can. What else
are you going to say? We were made to move. It's primal."
So is surviving, and Logan Beaulieu knows about that, too.
Born in Williams Lake and raised in Prince George and Penticton, Beaulieu's life
changed in a millisecond during the middle of the night when he was 16 years
old. He was the passenger in a buddy's car that was T-boned at an intersection
in Penticton. Logan's friend, Shaun, died instantly at impact on the driver's
side.
"They thought I was dead, too," Logan says. "One of the ambulance
guys noticed I was still breathing."
When paramedics arrived, Logan's leg was sticking through the passenger door.
The door was not open. His leg punctured it. Imagine the force required to do
that.
No alcohol was involved in the accident. No charges were laid. Logan didn't
quite die that warm night in 1988, but nobody knew if he'd survive the next one
and the one after that. He was airlifted to St. Paul's Hospital in Vancouver and
spent the next 17 days in a coma.
Moe, separated from Logan's mom, June, took leave from his radio advertising job
in Victoria to stay by Logan's bedside. Raised Catholic, Moe says he is more
spiritual than religious. But he figures other forces, besides Logan's will,
were at work.
"My grandmother told me when I was a kid -- my dad left when I was 15 so I
spent a lot of time with her -- she said she would be my guardian angel,"
Moe says. "She said if I or anyone I knew was ever in trouble, call on
her."
"I'd talk to Logan and sing to him songs my grandmother taught me. One
night I said: 'OK, son, it's 10 o'clock, so I'm going to leave now and see
yourcousin.' And he made a kissing sound. They said it was just a reaction to
pain and the drugs he was on. But I would not believe that he didn't know I was
there.
"His left side was paralyzed, but he could move his right arm (while
unconscious). One time he had his hand on my face and started pulling my hair. I
said: 'Son, you're hurting your dad.' So he patted my face and stroked my beard
and relaxed. And the nurses said, 'look at that."' Seventeen days after the
accident, Logan Beaulieu woke up.
"His mom was standing there facing him when I walked in the room," Moe
says. "He was really fuzzy, but he said: 'Mom, here's my big dad.' And I
started crying. At least I knew he could talk."
Apart from any neurological damage he may have suffered, he remained paralyzed
on one side. "Doctors told me I had a 10-per- cent chance to walk
again," Logan says, before adding: "Doctors always give you the
worst-case scenario."
Slowly, Logan began to regain feeling in his left hand. His father had him
squeeze a towel to start rebuilding strength. Logan could barely move. At one
point, he somehow made it to the end of his bed and tried standing. "Of
course, I fell on the floor," he says.
A wheelchair was brought in and Moe would bustle Logan into it, then order his
son to use his good hand to wheel himself a few metres.
"That is where my recovery began," Logan says. "That's when I
decided I was going to walk again, I was going to beat this."
Moe says a therapist told him, if all went well, Logan might be able to get out
of the wheelchair in six months. He was out of the wheelchair in three weeks.
But it would take much longer for him to run.
Transferred to the GF Strong Rehabilitation Centre in Vancouver, Logan took
daily walks around a grassy clearing. Moe half-carried him at the beginning.
Later, Logan would merely lean on his dad's shoulder. Soon he was holding on
only to Moe's arm, then eventually began hobbling around the park solo, using a
cane and mostly dragging his left leg along against its will.
"I'd walk with a very bad limp, walk slowly," Logan says. "It
felt like a football field I was walking around, a really big field. But I've
seen it since then and it was only a little field."
"I had to use a lot of tough love," Moe says. "He knew I loved
him, but I had to be almost like a drill sergeant. It's human nature to take the
easy way out."
After several months of rehab and a brief return to Penticton, where his mom
lived, Logan moved to Victoria to live with his dad. There was too much pain in
Penticton.
Logan worked with physical therapists and occupational therapists, strengthening
his body and mind. Moe rented an apartment for Logan, across the street from his
own home, so his son would have a sense of independence and learn to be
self-sufficient. Then Logan started to run. He had been an active kid, but was
no jock.
In Grade 5, Logan had finished fifth at the B.C. cross-country championships in
Richmond.
"Dad had us going out on three-mile runs, three days a week," says
sister Roxanna. "My dad's a bit eccentric."
Running became Logan's therapy. Running rejuvenated his body and cleared his
mind.
"Apart from the endorphins rush, running is great therapy in itself,"
he says. "It's great for the mind, especially when I was going through
school (after the accident) and found it difficult."
More than anything, Logan says, running restored his self- esteem.
Moe was a runner. Is a runner. He has completed 94 marathons and ultras and
entered his first ultra-marathon at age 42. Logan did his first at 21, five
years years after he should have died in his friend's car, five years after
doctors told him he had a one-in-10 chance to walk again. "I ran 401 laps
in case there was a miscount," Logan says. "I wanted to make sure I
did 100 miles. I love running. It was something I could do, something I could be
good at."
In 12 years, Logan has run 20 ultras and three marathons. He ran six ultras last
year and plans to do nine this season. The first of these is next Saturday, the
50-kilometre event in the Keremeos Kruncher, part of a series of B.C. trail
races organized by his father.
Logan moved to Edmonton two years ago because he wanted a change, something Moe,
who says he had 13 jobs in 30 years, can relate to. Moe says Logan is the living
bible his grandmother talked about. Logan has lived and worked in Northern
Ireland, Australia and Fiji, befriending people everywhere. He is pondering a
couple of job offers in Edmonton, and is leaning toward accepting one from Wal-
Mart.
"He's not 100 per cent, but he's 95 per cent," Moe says. "And he
uses that 95 to such an extent that it's like 150 per cent compared to other
people."
Logan admits his memory can fail him. He occasionally pauses in mid-sentence.
But no one who talks with him would suspect the horror he has overcome. He says
most of his friends don't know about the accident.
"I used to kind of hide from it," he says. "I suppose I still do.
It's almost like it was a lifetime ago. I hate to say it, but the memory of it
has faded. I just had to get on with my life. I was young enough. So much has
happened to me, I sort of forget how much I went through."
Logan says he hopes to attract sponsors who will help him become a role model
for other accident victims, proof that odds are beaten, that you can run
gloriously even after being told you might never walk or -- as his father says
-- that you can be reborn far, far down the trail.
Photo: Bruce Edwards , CanWest News Service
Credit: The Citizen
