John Eaton shared the following articles about Classmate
Bob Valkevich
MS took his career, gave him back passion
Man with MS takes on 50-mile trek across Bay Area
Sam McManis, Chronicle Staff Writer
Friday, June 21, 2002
©2002 San Francisco Chronicle.Bob Valkevich is the kind of guy who sandpapers sentimentality,
removing the maudlin edges to leave just the smooth, factual
narrative of his life. He doesn't get all weepy. You won't see him
taking in the matinee of "Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood."
Definitely not that kind of guy.Once, in the mid-1980s, he was a high-powered, highly stressed San
Francisco trial lawyer with a wife and three young children. Now, at
52, Valkevich uses a wheelchair or walker to get around, forced by
health to retire from his lucrative law practice, eight years divorced
and living alone in a Pleasant Hill subdivision.This is what multiple sclerosis can do to a body, a mind, a life.
So why is this man smiling?
Why is the tanned, trimmed, blond-locked Valkevich sipping coffee
in the shade of his backyard and saying he's never felt better, never
had his life and priorities so focused, never been in as good of shape
since he was an athletic teen thinking himself invincible?Because, well, let Bob tell it in his wry way.
"Because I'm like Lou Gehrig," he says. "I'm the luckiest man . . .
yadda, yadda, yadda."He laughs, then grabs his right thigh with both hands and crosses that
leg over his left with great difficulty."I don't want to get all sappy here, but when one door closes, three
more open," he says. "Some of the things you think are big tragedies
are really gifts. Having MS is one of the great doors that opened for
me. A lot of people are stuck in a hole of depression and don't realize
that."Valkevich was in that hole once, even was hospitalized for depression
once, in the mid-'90s. But now he is on the road in his snazzy titanium
racing wheelchair and taking part in this year's three-day, 50-mile MS
Challenge Walk,a fund-raising event for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society that
begins this morning in Pleasanton and ends Sunday afternoon at
Crissy Field in San Francisco.Although Valkevich has been training every day for a year -- he's a
familiar presence rolling through the undulating trail at the Lafayette
reservoir -- he matter-of-factly says he's not sure he can make the
trip. There are some brutal hills to conquer, especially in the 20-mile
Day 1 crossing Castro Valley to Hayward.Do not count him out, though. Valkevich has stared down bigger hills
than this and pulled himself out of that "hole of self-pity" after being
diagnosed in 1990 with this chronic disease of the central nervous
system. The MS Society thinks so much of Valkevich's efforts that it
named him the organization's ambassador for the event, which is
expected to raise $1 million for the Northern California chapter.Valkevich's life is a drama divided into three acts: before MS; denial
and then grudging acceptance of MS; and his current,
in-the-middle-of-MS "no barriers" period.In the '80s, Valkevich was a hard-working litigator who built his own
practice in San Francisco's Financial District specializing in family
and construction cases. His only physical problem then was with his
weight, since he was too busy with his practice and his young family
to exercise regularly."One day, I'm out for a run and right in the middle of it, I lost most of
my sight in my right eye," he says. "Over the course of a few weeks, I
was blind in the eye. Eye doctors tested me for everything and ruled
out MS. I was happy to hear that. I didn't know much about MS, but I
knew it involved being a cripple."Two months later, 80 percent of his vision returned to his right eye.
Valkevich didn't ask why. "I was just grateful it came back and chose
to look forward," he says. "But over the next few years I began to
notice some other things."Things such as blurry vision during his daily runs, an occasional limp
at the end of the day, fatigue. Valkevich has an old video of himself
mowing the lawn with a distinct limp, his 1-year-old trailing behind
him with a toy mower.He simply chose to ignore the signs. He was a guy. He would push
through it.In the summer of 1990, shortly after turning 40, Valkevich could no
longer ignore his symptoms. He and his young family were hiking
with another couple at Briones Regional Park in the East Bay when
Valkevich's legs buckled halfway up a hill."They totally froze up," he says. "This was different. The scary part
was, it didn't go away. I told my wife at the time to keep going, that
I'd rest and be OK and catch up. But it was a struggle just to get the
half-mile back to the car. I grabbed a big stick and pulled myself
along."Diagnosis: "Chronic progressive MS," he says, "a pretty good case of
it."Over the next five years, Valkevich's world collapsed. He went from
using a cane to two canes, to a walker to a wheelchair. The assault on
his central nervous system also affected Valkevich's cognitive ability,
which eventually forced him to retire from his practice and collect
disability because "people don't want to hire a broken lawyer."Valkevich had always derived identity from being a hard-charging
attorney, and he was just entering his mid-40s, peak earning years.
With that gone, "I was devastated." Depression descended, partly
because "my MS made the electrical systems in my brain misfire" and
partly because his life had been drastically altered. He was divorced
in 1994, stopped practicing law altogether in 1996 and had lost the
will to live."Nobody's ever accused me of being a quitter, but that was the one
point in my life I quit," he says. "But when I came out the hospital (in
1997), I had a new outlook. For the first time, I wanted to live to an
old age."Life is not cut and dried enough to present Valkevich with clearly
demarcated turning points. But he admits the course of his life
changed with one decision."I had to decide whether to get a battery-operated or a manual
wheelchair," he says. "It's a vanity thing. I'd seen too many people get
into power chairs and get out of shape. And I knew that if I got the
power chair, I'd get real lazy, real fast."Instead, he chose biceps and triceps power, and it's made all the
difference. Between free weights, yoga, swimming and traveling miles
and miles in his titanium chair, Valkevich has become an aerobic
animal with a strong, sculpted upper body.When he turned 50, he trained for months to make the 2.7-mile trek
around the Lafayette reservoir sans wheelchair or walker. It was one
of those midlife- crisis things guys do, he says. It took him five hours
to walk, but he did it. The next year, he vowed to climb the 1.5-mile
Vernal Falls at Yosemite with his two canes. It took him 12 hours, but
he did it."I almost quit a few times," he said. "It sounds like a cliche, but don't
focus on what you can't do."The 50-mile MS trek is Valkevich's toughest test yet. He says he's
never been in better shape, physically or emotionally. He's got joint
custody of his three children (two in high school, one in middle
school) and enjoys being a stay-at-home dad. His new girlfriend,
Claudia, who also has MS, will drive his support van during the
three-day event, and his family and friends are rooting him on.It shouldn't matter whether Valkevich completes the arduous journey
since, well, he's already come a long way.But don't tell Valkevich that.
"I want to do it," he says, flatly.
This article appeared in the Contra Costa Times:
Jun. 18, 2002Spirited athlete wheels himself to victory
Age: 52Height: 6 foot 4 inches
Weight: 230 pounds
Personal: Three teen-age children; divorced; Pleasant Hill resident
Occupation: Retired attorney
Physical history: Bob Valkevich is learning to live with the affects of
multiple sclerosis, and he certainly feels better than he did 12 years ago
when he was first diagnosed. At that time, he was in the grips of a
high-pressure career as a trial attorney and was raising three young
children. Exercise was not really a part of his program. Now, exercise is a
way of life.In 1997 after a long hospitalization, Valkevich bought himself a manual
wheelchair with the intent to force himself to get back in shape."I intentionally picked up a manual wheelchair because I figured a battery
chair would be too easy and I would get lazy," he says. "I knew that just to
get around in it I would have to get into better physical shape. I wanted to
be more active than I was. When I did nothing, my condition got worse and I
was letting myself deteriorate."Since then, Valkevich has used his wheelchair to stay fit and to travel all
around the state of California. He has traversed the trails of Yosemite and
the desert sands of Anza-Borrego State Park near San Diego. On Friday,
Valkevich begins a three-day, 50-mile journey from Pleasanton to the San
Francisco Marina as a participant in the MS Challenge Walk, a fund-raising
event for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society. Four hundred people are
scheduled to participate in the walk, but Valkevich will be the only athlete
wheeling himself the distance."The victory is in the effort, not the accomplishment," Valkevich says. "The
point is getting out there and trying something, not sitting in my chair and
wishing how things could be."Plan of attack: Valkevich's main workout routine is at the Lafayette
Reservoir. His training schedule for the MS Challenge Walk has him there
about five days a week. On a light day, Valkevich wheels himself around two
laps (nearly six miles); on a heavy day he goes four laps (nearly 12 miles).
He prefers the reservoir because it is easy to measure his progress there.
Yoga is also part of his regime. He practices his postures and meditation
every morning and attends a yoga class designed for people with MS once a
week.The gift that keeps giving: Valkevich says that MS has helped him see all of
life's possibilities. "Doors just keep opening," he says. "You start
becoming aware of all that's around you. So many people don't realize what
is out there if we only take little steps." He learned that lesson on his
50th birthday, when he challenged himself to walk the Lafayette Reservoir
with his canes. He walked three miles in five hours and cried tears of joy
when he was finished. "I thought, 'If I can do this, I could do Yosemite.'"
The next year he climbed to the top of Vernal Falls.Advantages: Improved health is the No. 1 benefit of exercise for Valkevich.
"Health is a vehicle that avails oneself for the opportunities out there in
life. I was a slave to my career for a long time, and now I am catching up
on life. I am a stay-at-home dad who has seen my kids go through the most
important time of their lives. The healthier I am, the better my sprits
are."Goals: "I have one goal and it is recurring: Make the most of today."
Advice: "Remember that your mind and your spirit can be the greatest healing
tools you have -- or your worst enemies. It's up to you. Try to make the
most of what you have. Little steps are the only way to walk a mile."-- Elizabeth Sivesind