Life is precious.
Live it fully.
That could well be the motto of Kris Perry.
No sleep-walking through life for this young man.
“The best thing for me is to stay active,” he says. “Maybe it’s just being young and stupid.”
Or knowing that life can end with the next breath.
So he goes for the gusto.
Climb Mount Rainier? He’s done that.
Subject his body to perhaps the ultimate physical challenge — an ironman triathlon? He’s done that, too.
“Anything,” he says, “is possible.”
That’s what he has learned about himself since graduating from Snohomish High School in 2006.
Graduation. A big moment in a kid’s life. A fun week. The family comes together to celebrate a youngster’s accomplishments.
Fun week? His was hell week. Perry was panicking over four blood clots that had been discovered in his right leg.
“They’d done an ultrasound at a clinic (in Everett) and the doctors didn’t want me to drive (to the hospital) a couple of blocks away,” he said. “I started freaking out.”
He ended up at Seattle Children’s Hospital where he stayed for a week as the clots were dissolved.
The year before, he had suffered pain in his left leg and undergone physical therapy for what was thought to be tendon damage. But the pain persisted through track season, in which he was a long jumper and triple jumper.
“I still had speed,” he said, “but I couldn’t jump.”
Perry was eventually diagnosed with Deep Vein Thrombosis (DVT), a blood clot that normally occurs in the leg. “If the blood clot dislodges, it can travel to the lungs and cause a blockage known as pulmonary embolism or lung clot,” according to the National Alliance for Thrombosis &Thrombophilia website. “Lung clots affect over 530,000 people a year” and they often can be fatal.
To prevent further clotting, Perry was put on Coumadin, a blood thinner that he’ll have to take daily for the rest of his life.
He also took up running to improve circulation. For inspiration, all he had to do was look at his dad, Bob Perry, recognized as one of the finest long distance runners in the region.
Kris had a ways to go to match his dad’s feats. “When I first started, I couldn’t run around a track,” he said. “My left leg would get so fatigued. That’s where I had a lot of vein damage.”
He wouldn’t be deterred, though. By July of that year, he was running five miles without stopping. Encouraged, he signed up for a 6.2-mile race at Lake Stevens.
He enjoyed it so much that he set a goal for himself: to run one race a month for a year.
Running was OK, but it got boring after awhile. He needed something else to spice up his workouts. He took up biking. Which led to swimming.
Which led to a triathlon in the spring of 2007. He did a quarter-mile swim, a 12-mile bike ride and a 3.1-mile run in one hour and seven minutes.
“It was pretty cool,” he said.
Kris was hooked. Over a 2-year period, he would do eight triathlons, his most impressive performance coming in the Lake Stevens half-ironman, where he was 264th in a field of 882.
The kid who once couldn’t make a lap around a track had come a long way. The best was yet to come.
As a student at Everett Community College in 2007, Kris had a buddy who had signed up to climb Mt. Rainier. Kris asked him if there were any openings left in his group and when he found out there were, he called his parents.
“I have the money,” he told them.
That made no difference to his mother, Kim. Her response: a flat-out “no.”
His dad had some concerns, but ultimately left it up to his son.
Kris booked the trip on Nov. 7 of 2007. He made the climb in July of 2008.
“He sets his mind to do something,” his dad said, “there’s no stopping him.”
One major concern: He could bleed to death if he suffered a cut. “I knew there was some risk,” Kris said. But, looking back on his life, he realized he could have been killed by those blood clots. Or getting hit crossing a street.
He would take his chances. Life can either be an adventure or an endless humdrum. “This,” he said, “was another test for me.”
Aside from some nausea, he passed it without incident. His only disappointment: a cloud cap at the summit prevented his group from seeing much.
When he next visited his doctor, Dana Matthews, at Children’s, Kris remembered her asking him what he had been up to. He told her that during a three-week period he had completed two triathlons and climbed Mount Rainier. “Really?” he recalled her saying. “We talked about that.”
“I would never have said he can’t do it,” Dr. Matthews said. Not that it would have done any good if she had. “I knew nothing would hold him back,” his mother said.
Determined young man that he is, Kris’ next big challenge was a full-fledged Ironman, the same one he had watched his Uncle Shawn do in Couer d’alene, Idaho, in 2007.
“That was awe-inspiring,” Kris said.
Think about this now. You put your body through more than 140 miles of torture. You swim 2.4 miles, you bike 112 miles, and, if you’re still kicking, you finish with a run of 26.2 miles.
Kris made it through the first two steps in 8 1/2 hours. The only glitch: He developed a profuse nose bleed at mile 12 of the bike ride and by the time he got it plugged with a piece of gauze, his shirt was covered with blood, causing his uncle to freak out when he passed him on the course. Neither blood nor a downpour halfway through the run could deter Kris Perry on this day, however. Fifteen hours after he started, he sprinted across the finish line.
Now in his junior year at Central Washington University in Ellensburg, he’s training with a triathlon club that just got started.
Back on the homefront, younger brother Brenden, 14, is so inspired by what Kris has done that he’s taken up triathlon training.
That’s not all. “He did Rainier at 18,” Brenden said, “I want to do it at 17.”
And kids wonder why their parents turn gray.
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
