This Tuesday, June 14, Joan Nani Roma (Folgueroles, 1972) has it on her agenda to return to the operating room. His bladder, which was diagnosed with cancer in March, will be rebuilt at Vall d’Hebron Hospital in Barcelona. A little thinner – he has lost 2 or 3 kg – but with his usual good humor, Rome receives La Vanguardia in his house, a 17th century farmhouse in the Lluçanès (Barcelona), overlooking Rasos de Peguera, the mountains of Sija, Montserrat, La Mola, Montseny and Cabrerès; his comrades these last three months of imprisonment.
How are you?
Well, within the situation. This chemo thing is harder than I thought, but I’m through. Two weeks ago I did the last of the 6 sessions, for 9 weeks. I have been able to endure the cycles, it has been very hard, with difficult moments. It leaves you with an unpleasant feeling, because of the chemistry in the body. You’re a mess, lying on the couch all day. The first chemo I took as a “this will not be able to me”, and yes it can. I hope I never experience it again.
Does being an elite athlete in great physical shape help to carry it?
Yes help. But the more you endure, the more good gasoline they throw at you, and the better it helps the treatment.
At what stage of the treatment process are you?
They have to do the second operation (tomorrow); They’ll reconstruct my bladder to clean it all out. The first intervention was on March 10 to get the most out of the tumor. A week before he was running a rally in Lorca.
How it all started?
I went to the doctor thinking I had a kidney stone. At the Lorca rally in March, I noticed a puncture in the kidneys, something strange that had never happened to me before. I went to the doctor, they did an ultrasound on Vic, and they saw a foreign body in my bladder. The next day, at the Dexeus clinic, a CAT scan confirmed that it was a tumor. And the next day they took it away. In three days the world fell on me.
How did you take it?
At first you don’t believe it, it’s a very heavy word. When you hear “tumor, cancer” it’s scary. I immediately asked the doctors if that would send me to the other side… When Dr. Ibarz from Dexeus tells me that he is concentrated and that there is a solution, you already see it differently: I have taken it as an injury, rather than as an illness . As if it were a personal challenge to beat the injury.
There was risk though…
It was an aggressive tumor; luck is that it was born localized, if it had been displaced we would have seen it later and perhaps it would have already spread, with metastasis… We have ruled that out with the tests. Also, the chemo has done a good job.
Didn’t you notice anything before?
I reproached myself for not having found it, especially for being an athlete who does a lot of checkups. Most people who have a tumor of this type urinate blood. In the Dakar I urinated a little blood, and in the previous one… because with so many impacts on the kidneys you make a little bloody urine. I saw it normal.
Is he a good patient?
No, a disaster. I want to understand everything, to know things, to have them explain it to me… I’m very annoying with doctors. Oncologists are not used to being beaten up on duty pointing in the notebook. I look at the analytics, I ask about the hematocrit, the hemoglobin… It helps me understand and recover.
After the operation, how much will you need to recover and return to sports activity?
It is important not to rush. The luck is that it is a quick part to recover. A month after the operation you start to function. I hope to do it in July, but obstacles can always arise. I do not fear them; I will face them.
And return to pilot, when?
At the beginning of October at the rally in Morocco. And start training, little by little, since July. I am lucky to have the Sant Cugat CAR, the trainer, the help of Dr. Quim Terricabras to supervise me. I want to set up a good structure to arrive well and have confidence.
So, will it be in the Dakar 2023?
And so much! In life it is important to have goals.
Do the doctors see it possible?
For them there is no problem. They say I can do it. If a vital organ was affected, it would be difficult to return to a high level of sport. I just have to recover physically. In two or three months he could recover the lost muscle tone.
Did it cross your mind to retire?
No, because it is not in my plans that I do not get ahead of cancer. I think only positive things. Sport has helped me accept reality. Losing a Dakar two days from the finish is a stick, and this is the same: reality is this, you accept it and move on.
Has cancer changed your perspective?
You see more the priority of things. You realize that the sun rises every day. Now I take things differently, more calmly. And I value more when I am well. I’ve never been in the hospital for more than two days, and now I’ve spent five, and many days in a row, feeling sick, shit. Now I value it much more when I feel good.
Is cancer, chemo, the worst thing you’ve ever experienced?
Yes, and so much. But that the accidents of the Dakar. In 2003 in Libya I had an accident and my leg was immobile. When I had a bad accident it wasn’t an unpleasant feeling like now. I never thought that I would not overcome these trances.
Have you thought about death?
No, because it is not something that is in my plans right now. My luck is that I have been told that there is a solution.
