A New Kind of Hero : My Bride

In the eighth grade, I wrote a Modern Woodman speech on my hero. As far as I know, that’s still the topic for that particular school’s speech competition. I picked Carl Brashear and in retrospect, that makes little sense. I spent more time drooling over Nightcrawler than I did military personelle, and for good reason. I’ve found heroes of history and mythology and writing since then, heroes of the faith and heroes of resistance. Joseph Campbell would chime in and say that we need heroes because heroes leave the comfort of society, learn the lessons of various trials and bring back the insight needed to change us. He’d say we need greatness, not fame–that our worship of celebrities and our marginalization of heroes wounds society. Because of that, I keep looking for different kinds of heroes and I’ve found another one–one worthy of a rewrite of history. I hereby change my Modern Woodman speech:

My wife’s my hero.

At fifteen, they diagnosed her with Type 1 Diabetes. Most people put some sort of illness blame on type-oners because of how many type-two patients develop the disease due to life habits. These two diseases, though linked in their outcome, could not differ more in genesis. Type 2 develops when, over the course of time, your body begins to resist insulin–that peptide hormone that converts the sugar in your blood into energy. Type 1 can happen at birth. See, your insulin comes from the Beta cells in your pancreas, it’s one of those involuntary body processes like breathing or farting that you and I take for granted until the day they stop working. Needless to say, her beta cells went on an indefinite strike and ever since, Tara has had to work as a manual pancreas. Unlike all other chronic illnesses, 90% of diabetic care comes from the patient. Count it–ninety. Often people roll their eyes or point fingers at a diabetic when his health takes a turn for the worst. In reality, most people never realize when a diabetic goes to the restroom to change their injection site or notice when they draw blood to check their BGL. I mean it when I say that Tara does her pancreatic work manually. This started out with shots and transferred to button mashing her insulin pump for the high score. Well… not the high score. When her sugars go too high, it stresses out her blood vessels. When they go low, it stresses out her brain. One way, she could end up in a coma or lose limbs or eyes. The other way, she could end up in a coma permanently or damage her brain from seizures.

Sound like fun?

Now you or I, especially the majority of the readership here who seem to bend toward the literary and aesthetic, we trend toward a sedentary lifestyle rather than an athletic one. In short, we nerds and geeks might find it hard to get up and run. Ask us to run a mile and we might interpret that as putting our MMO character on auto-travel while we go grab corn dogs from the freezer. Ask us to run a 5k and our entire body revolts. Tara, though not of the MMO group, fits in with us chair-oriented folk. To run a 5k would earn applause from the rest of us.

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But Tara enjoys all the wonderful benefits of Type 1 Diabetes–benefits like going for days on end feeling like throwing up because she ate too many cookies (“too many” meaning one bite), benefits like waking up in the middle of the night gasping “I’m… I’m… diabetes” and hoping my awoken-out-of-dead-sleep-mind both hears and interprets this as “Your wife is low. Get your butt out of bed, grab a glass of milk, the Oreos and then get started on the peanut butter toast.”

These Type-1 perks lead to drastic energy loss during strenuous exercise–after all, your body feeds and operates on sugar. When I ran cross-country in grade school, they normally told us to eat a full plate of spaghetti the night before the race. For Tara, substitute “feel all day like throwing up, inhaling water, and taking a power drill to my head for the headache” where you see “spaghetti.” One diabetic compared this whole experience to running a race while wearing chain mail. Another way to put it is, “how many of you nerds feel like running a half-marathon right about now?”

Yesterday, my gorgeous bride saw the fruit of three months of training. Three months coming in everyday and saying, “Lance–I ran for a minute today,  the most I’ve EVER RUN in my LIFE!” and “Lance–I ran for five minutes today which is the most I’ve EVER RUN in my LIFE!” and “LANCE I RAN FOR TWENTY MINUTES!” Three months of training despite the upper-respiratory infections circulating Schaubert Abbey for the past eight weeks. Three months of training, of dragging her inner nerd around the block kicking, screaming, begging for an alternative.

Three months of training despite diabetes.

Yesterday, my wife not only finished her first 5k, let alone first athletic competition of any kind, she also placed sixth in her age group:

There’s not a prouder husband alive. There’s also not a husband whose inner nerd has been put to more shame by his wife’s inner nerd. I’m proud. I’m inspired. I’m glad I married such a persevering and overcoming woman in a world full of assault, whether physical assault or emotional assault or the assault of an immune system on one innocent pancreas. She never stopped. She never will.

She’s great, and knowing her influences my life far more than any celebrity. Tara Schaubert–my hero.

(Go to the comments and congratulate her!)

Notes:

Picture 1: You can tell I’ve got windswept hair. This one’s right after the race. She normally prefers clapping to touching after she runs due to the sweat, but I didn’t care. I picked her up off her feet in a big ol’ bear hug.

Pic 2: That’s her after the Mother Road marathon. Her shirt’s caption? “One Tough Mother Runner”

Pic 3: The start. 

Pic 4: My buddy Ryan’s kid (we’ll call him Shark Fin) showed up with a duck call trumpet and a shirt that had letters ironed on by his mom: I love Tara. Me too, Shark Fin, me too.

Pic 5: Results from her first.

Pic 6: Two lucky numbers surrounded by two prime integers that add up to a dozen. Good numerology suggests she’ll do well. Photo taken by T.

Pic 7: Photo taken by T. 

Pic 8: The end of the race. If you’ll look closely, you’ll notice Tara at the front of the pack, hauling tail and kicking butt.

Unless otherwise noted, all photos taken by Momma Balu. Thanks, Mom & Dad for coming. Also Ryan & fam. Also you, BG. 


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  1. peggy s

    What a wonderful tribute to a wonderful person in your life!!!We are so very proud of her. Please pass on our heartiest congratulations!!!

    1. lanceschaubert

      Will do, thanks!

      Yeah, I wondered if it wasn’t an anthology contest–but hopefully you’ll win anyway, huh? We will and thank you so much.

      Love you too.

  2. JD Miller

    Very well done Tara! I have always flirted the lines between the athletic and the nerd kingdoms. As a lineman though, running has never been in my realm of desires. For that, well done! However, I am one of the few people who is not affected in some aspect of my life by the danger and damage of Diabetes. I grew up without anyone in my life who suffered from this illness. Well, to be clear, I used to be. When I took on my Youth Ministry in Kimberling City, Missouri back in May, I met a young girl by the name of Maddie. Maddie is the daughter of one of my sponsors. At the age of two, she was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes. As the weeks passed we became close to her family and I began to truly see the toll and toil of a life confined by Type 1 Diabetes. Her struggle is both courageous and majestic, and I have finally begun to see that this is ordinary life for the extraordinary people who daily survive Type 1 Diabetes. Your accomplishment is nothing less than miraculous, and may God be given glory for your commitment to control your Diabetes, and not allow it to control you. So once again, Very Well Done!

    1. lanceschaubert

      JD — Thank you. Really, thanks. This’ll mean a whole lot to her.

  3. Deb

    What an amazing and impressive young woman. Tara, you’re just too stubborn to admit something can’t be done, so you just go ahead and do it. So impressed. Again. It wasn’t just hyperbole from Lance, you know. You are a hero. There’s just no more appropriate word. Can’t wait to see what you take on next.

    1. lanceschaubert

      Indeed. She’s a champ in my book. Thanks for encouraging her, Deb.

  4. logankstewart

    Congratulations, Tara! I’ve been on the “get healthy and start running” train since June, and the amount of time & dedication you have to put into training is worthy of praise. So, again, congratulations! Great job at sticking with it and for running the 5k. Keep it up.

    1. lanceschaubert

      Woot! Where are you at in the Tolkien podcast? After I stopped riding, I started missing things…

  5. Rachelle Garden

    Congratulations!!! From one type-oner to another!!! I too have an insulin pump and my husband fills the role of midnight sugar raids as well…hats off to you too Lance its not an easy job either. Ive never attempted a 5k since i have major back and knee problems but i do need to get out and walk more…thanks for the inspiration!! Keep up the good work 🙂

    1. lanceschaubert

      Thanks for encouraging her, Rachelle. Thanks for visiting and also for encouraging me. How long ago were you diagnosed?

  6. Doberman

    Yay Tara! I loved reading this and feel so happy for you!

    1. lanceschaubert

      Woot. (Thanks for the support Dman).

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How?

Well, see, your comments & sharing whisper a few things to those who come after you:

The first is that this site is a safe place to speak up & stay curious. That it's civil. That discussion is encouraged. That there's no such thing as a stupid question (being a student of Socrates, I really and truly believe this). That talking to one another and growing together is more important than anything we could possibly publish. That the point is growing in virtue and growing together and growing wise. That discovery is invention, deference is originality, that we all can rise together. The only folks I'm going to take comments down from are obvious jerks who argue in bad faith, don't stay curious, or actively make personal attacks. And, frankly, I'd rather we talk here than on some social media farm — I will never show ads and the only thing I'm selling anywhere on the site or my mailing list is just the stuff I make.

You're also helping folks realize that anything you & they build together is far more important than anything you come to me to read. I take the things I write about seriously, but I don't take myself seriously: I play the fool, I hate cults of personality, and I also don't really like being the center of attention (believe it or not). I would much rather folks connect because of an introduction I've made or because they commented with one another back and forth and then build something beautiful together. My favorite contributions have been lifelong business and love partnerships from two people who have forgotten I introduced them. Some of my closest friends NOW I literally met on another blog's comment section fifteen years ago. I would love for that to happen here — let two of you meet and let me fade into the background.

Last, you help me revise. I'm wrong. Often. I'm not embarrassed to admit it or worried about being cancelled or publicly shamed. I make a fool out of myself (that's sort of the point). So as I get feedback, I can say, "I was wrong about that" and set a model for curious, consistent learning, and growing in wisdom. I'm blind to what I don't know and as grows the island of my knowledge so grows the shoreline of my ignorance. It's the recovery of innocence on the far end of experience: a child is in a permanent state of wonder. So are the wise: they aren't afraid of saying, "I don't know. That's new: please teach me." That's my goal, comments help. And I read all reviews: my skin's tough, but that's not license to be needlessly cruel. We teach one another our habits and there's a way to civilly demolish an idea without demolishing another person: just because I personally can take the world's meanest 1-star review doesn't mean we should teach one another how to be crueler on the internet.

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