Why I Committed to a 60k Run on 16 Days Notice

And why you should support me

Nov 10, 2022

The Answer: Because I am a fuckin’ idiot…

I’m kidding. As much as the above may be true, far too many Australian Men are dying from treatable conditions. When presented with an opportunity to help in even a small way, I felt like there was no good reason not to.

Treatable Conditions

Prostate Cancer

Did you know that Prostate Cancer is the second most commonly diagnosed cancer in Australian men? It is estimated that 24,217 Australian Men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer already in 2002. Of all new cancer diagnoses in Australian men, 27% of them are prostate cancer. It’s estimated that 3,507 Australian Males will die from prostate cancer this year alone. That’s 11 Australian men PER DAY and 13% of all male deaths in Australia.

The good news is, there is a 96% chance of surviving at least 5 years with prostate cancer. At the end of 2017, 89,005 Australian Men were living with prostate cancer that had been diagnosed within the last five years. Prostate cancer is very treatable, but only if it is detected and treated early and we are getting much better at it. Between 1989 and 1993 the survival rate of prostate cancer was only 63%. Now it is 96%. How fucking good is that?

My interpretation of the above information is that with early enough detection, we could see that the survival rate gets even higher. That’s where we have seen so much improvement in recent years and why I believe the survival rate is improving so much.

I remember only 17 years ago when I left school and joined the workforce in construction, there was a stigma around getting checked for prostate cancer. Back then the examination was far more invasive and I distinctly remember hearing blokes saying things like “Oh I couldn’t do that! I’d rather have cancer than get fingered in the ass!”

There’s a fair chance that comments like that were people just having a laugh, and fair enough. But I think those jokes come from somewhere a little more serious. If that fear didn’t exist at all, then how does the brain even think to make that joke? Fortunately, the examination process these days is far less invasive and I think there’s a lot less stigma around prostate cancer because of it.

All that aside, prostate cancer is still killing far too many Australian Men. The data shows that we are on the correct trajectory. It seems as though we as a community have some serious momentum, so I think we’d be mad not to jump on the back of that and ride its coattails into an even higher survival rate.

Testicular Cancer

While Testicular Cancer doesn’t affect as many of us as prostate cancer, it’s still a serious issue. It’s estimated that 964 Australian Men will be diagnosed with testicular cancer this year already, making up 1.1% of all cancer diagnosed in Australian Men. It’s estimated that 31 Australian Men will die from testicular cancer already this year at 0.11%.

Testicular cancer has a survival rate of 97%, which is fantastic. Which is up from around 95% in the period between 1989 and 1993. So we are getting better at diagnosing and treating it. But again, we are on a great trajectory, we have momentum, and now is not the time to get complacent, now is the time to capitalise on that momentum and medical advancements and see that survival rate inch closer and closer to 100%.

A lot like prostate cancer, I think there is something of a stigma around testicular cancer. Not many Australian blokes would feel comfortable having a doctor snap on a rubber glove and fondle with his stones. But we need to get past that. This is serious stuff and for lack of a better phrase, as Aussie blokes so often say, we need to grow up and just bloody get it done.

Mental Health

We all know the generic facts about Mental Health in Australian Men. Of the eight Australians who take their own life each day, 6 of them are men. 2190 Australian Men die every year from suicide. Whilst treatment for mental health issues is extremely nuanced, I believe every single suicide in Australia is entirely unnecessary. But there is so much more to Mental Health than suicide and I think sometimes as a community we’re guilty of seeing past that.

These figures are from the study in the link above. is was published in September 2020.

25% of Australian men experience a diagnosed mental health condition in their lifetime and 15% experienced a disorder in any one 12-month period. That means roughly one in eight people Australian men you know are struggling right now! That’s one in four. How many people are in your family, work group, friendship group, etc? You would know one of these people!

12.2% of Australian men between 16 and 85 either currently have or have been affected by depression or bipolar disorder.

20.4% of Australian men aged 18 to 65 have experienced anxiety at some point. 9% of boys aged 10 to 14 are reported to suffer from anxiety while 7% of boys aged 15 to 17 years old are reported to suffer from depression. This grows to 13% in adult men up to the age of 57. What is alarming to me is that we are identifying mental health issues in young boys, which is great, but the numbers are still increasing. There’s a key step here somewhere that we’re struggling to identify or treat.

80% of those men who reported mental health conditions saw a GP but only 40% took it a step further and saw an actual mental health professional. Maybe some of them got the treatment they needed from the GP and didn’t require anything more. I think though a lot of the problem is the friction between someone who needs help and the help. To see a mental health professional you have to go to the GP and get a referral. Then you have to book an initial consult with the specialist. These are longer, far more expensive consultations. Often you will have to wait up to six months to get in for an initial consultation. I just can’t wrap my head around why, in such an important field, more isn’t being done to try to help these people who need it. I don’t have the answers, but maybe you have some?

Leave a comment

What I do know is, we’re not going to get answers without asking questions. I think the crux of my point here is that people who need professional help are already feeling overwhelmed, scared, nervous, or anxious. The slightest bit of friction between them and the help they need is the perfect excuse to turn and run. This might sound odd, to some, but whilst a lot of people are unhappy within their illness, they’ve grown accustomed to it. They’ve found comfort in it (Click here to read about why this happens). Being vulnerable and putting yourself out there is uncomfortable. So people return to their comfort zone as soon as something is the slightest bit hard.

Around 4%, or one in 25, reported feeling lonely. This is concerning. one in 25 men didn’t feel like they had a friend or family member they could lean on. Not one? That’s tragic!

Of all men who self-reported experiencing depression in 20130/14, 40% reported that they had either relapsed or were experiencing major depressive symptoms in 2015/16. So these are people who have self-reported their experience, they’re well aware of how they are feeling, yet years later, 40% are still in the same position. That means some of them would have been depressed for the entire period. When you consider how short life is, it’s fuckin’ horrible to think people out there are feeling so low for such an extended period!

Roughly one-quarter of adult males admitted that they had thought about harming themselves at one point in their lives while a tenth of young men and adult males admitted to making a suicide plan.

Around 80% of young men and adult-aged men said they would be very unlikely to seek help from a phone helpline.

The above statistics were referenced from the Ten to Men: the Australian Longitudinal Study on Male Health

I wanted to share these statistics because I think they often get glossed over. We all know the damning statistic about suicide, but I think we often forget to consider just how many people are suffering.

We always say cute shit like, “I’m here if you need a chat”, and “it’s not weak to speak up about your problems”, which is all fantastic. But clearly, it’s not enough because we are still losing people eight people to suicide every single day, which is eight too many.

I think we’re not placing enough emphasis on the stage between being well and suicide, should it get to that point. Obviously, there are a lot of people out there who either can’t bring themselves to ask for help, don’t know where to find it or the process is too difficult.

The thing that I think a lot of people don’t understand is that when you are unwell mentally, you are living in overwhelm. Your self-worth is shot. At times you genuinely feel as though the energy and effort required by you and others to get the help you need is simply not worth it. It sounds ridiculous to someone in good health, but someone who is struggling will genuinely believe that they are either irreparably unwell or that they simply don’t deserve it.

That’s where I think we as a community need to improve. I think incrementally we are getting there, but through conversation and raising awareness you can start a sprawling web of conversation where people talk openly about how they feel, how they or someone they know went about getting help, and how grateful they are that they did seek that help. If a person speaks to four people, then they each speak to four people, and so on, maybe this is how we will help not only get the message across but also connect people to each other who can help each other. It doesn’t need to be professional help initially. It can be community groups like

The R4R Rag

, it can even be one mate saying to another, “hey mate, this is how I went about it, I found it really beneficial, let me help you. I can come to your appointment with you” or similar.

Whatever the case, we are not there yet, not by a long way. So, I’m going to keep on talking about it and encouraging others to do the same.

If you find Sobering Thoughts helpful or think it could help someone else please give it a share!

Here I am last Sunday at The Canberra Times Fun Run Arthur (half-marathon) dying (and rolling out. FFS)

You might be thinking, ok but how does a bloke who is built like a chest freezer slowly running a couple of laps around Lake Burley Griffin help anyone?

Well, bare with me. I’m sure you’ve heard of Movember. If you haven’t click here. Movember is a charity that originated in Melbourne Australia in 2003 that raises money for the causes mentioned above simply by blokes people growing their mustaches.

You start off clean-shaven on the first of November and essentially you are not allowed to shave your mustache for the entire month. People then raise money through donations that can be claimed back on their taxes. Often people will have a party or get together at the end of the month for one last push to raise more funds, shave the mustaches off, declare the best and worst mustaches, etc. Pretty simple stuff and all good fun.

This year Movember and activewear brand Lululemon have teamed up so that people can do things outside of growing a mustache to help raise much-needed funds for these incredibly important causes. In this instance, people are committing to run certain distances on Saturday the 26th of November in exchange for donations. The Movember Foundation has raised over $ 174 million worldwide. They donate all proceeds to charities such as The Prostate Cancer Foundation of Australia, Livestrong, and Beyond Blue among others.

Yesterday morning I saw someone share a link for this collaboration and I was pretty interested. I asked a few people if they were interested and got a couple of no's and a couple of maybes. I may have misunderstood at the time, but I read it as you could run 10, 30, or 60 kilometers on Saturday the 26th of November to participate. I thought fuck it, I'll have a crack at the 60k. I’ve never run that far before, but I've run 50 before. I ran a good Arthur (half-marathon) on the weekend, I've been feeling good while running late, I’ll do the fucker on my own.

Emily Murphy

, a legend at

The R4R Rag

mentioned she was going to start a team, so I thought fuck it, and signed up. Hopefully, we get a couple more people to jump on, eh?

The Milkbar

Struggling by Ben Alexander

Running Rare

Peak2Soon

Clare Carey

So, there it is, on Saturday the 26th of November I will (attempt to) run 60 k’s. Two laps around The Great Lake, Lake Burley Griffin. I’m going to start nice and early in a bid to minimise the amount of time I spend running in the sun later in the morning. If successful this will be my longest run. I would like to get it done in six hours, but we’ll just have to see how we go.

I understand times are tough. Christmas is coming up. We are all looking forward to some time off and hopefully a holiday in our first bushfire/COVID-free Christmas in three years. Interest rate rises are hurting too. However, if you have a few bob to spare, consider donating a small amount of money to our team to help some people out who desperately need it. I will be donating every dollar I make from paid subscribers in November to kick it off. Click here if you’re interested in donating.

Why Run, Why 60k, Why All in one Run?

I could easily have chosen a shorter distance. I could have chosen to run the distance over a week, a month, or whatever. I wanted to challenge myself. I misunderstood the task initially. But now I kind of like it. If I wasn’t prompted by the post I saw on social media, if I wasn’t stupid enough to misinterpret the instruction, I never would have thought to head out on a 60k run with 16 days’ notice. I guess this is just an opportunity that’s presented itself and I’m keen to see if I’m up to it.

There are people in oncology wards getting loaded up with chemo, there are people in psychiatric wards scared and confused about what the fuck is going on. There are people out there struggling. I’m fighting some of my own battles too, many of us are. But some of us are fighting a little bit harder right now. I’m not a millionaire, and I’m also not a doctor or a scientist, but I can run really slowly for a fair distance, so that’s how I’m going to do my bit.

Click here if you’re interested in donating.

Cheers Wankers

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