Ben Sasse

And this fall, I'd been training for some short tries, and I ended up with a ton of back pain.

And I realized, oh, maybe it's stupid to be wearing the 45-pound weight vest all the time, not just when you're training for running events, but also on your bike, because it turns out that's not the right posture to be wearing a lot of weight.

And so I ended up late October, Halloween-ish, with a lot of back and abdominal pain, and I thought I just pulled some ab muscles from stupid forms of training.

But over the course of November, I ended up in significant enough pain that I went to my executive doc at the University of Florida.

And I said, something's not right here.

and we did a bunch of tests, couldn't find anything.

And they said, we're gonna refer you to a GI specialist.

We're gonna figure out whether it's undiagnosed celiac or lactose intolerance or something.

And I said, I'm farm kid by upbringing, not the toughest guy on earth, but I don't have a cheese allergy.

There's something really, really wrong in my back.

And so they sent me for full body scans on the morning of December 13 or 14.

And they called me back 45 minutes later, and you could just hear them hemming and hawing.

And I said, stop beating around the bush.

Like, give me a hard fact.

And they started talking about, well, we don't want to be too premature.

And there's been so many changes in oncology care.

And I'm like, dude, you have not told me I have cancer yet.

And you're talking to me about how great oncology care is.

From a person who clearly is not shooting straight.

And I said, would you give me a hard fact?