Cancer 4 Me 5 man comes home to Horseleap with inspirational book

Liam Ryan has a big, big personality yet even he is dwarfed by the size of his ambition. A decade on from beating cancer, the 50-year-old Horseleap native will return home this Saturday and launch his bid to raise €3m for fellow cancer patients.If this seems an exercise in foolishness, especially given the recessionary times we live in, then bear in mind the life hurdles Liam has overcome. That story has just been published, titled Cancer 4 Me 5 (after extra time) - and on Saturday in Paddy Ryan's pub, his homeplace in Horseleap, the author will return home to launch both his book, and his drive, to reach the €3m target."This book is aimed at cancer patients of tomorrow," Liam said. "It's to show that miracles can happen, that people can survive, that cancer can be beaten. It's to help people who get diagnosed to feel encouraged that someone like me could draw positives from dreadful news and come back."Jane Tomlinson raised £2 million pounds sterling in six years. My aim is to surpass that total in the rest of my life. What I want is for cancer to regret ever choosing me."It was 2002 when cancer entered his life. Diagnosed with a rare case in his head and neck, a specialist told Liam he had only seen one previous case. "And that guy died within a month."Liam, however, fought back. Surgery in Liverpool saved his life but survival was complicated by two bouts of meningitis and three years of total exhaustion. And then, amid the trauma, came a new perspective. "I'd watch the news, listen to stories of young men being killed in road accidents and realise I had a lucky break."Positive thinking became his bywords. And as his health improved and five years passed since his diagnosis, Liam's first passion, athletics, returned to his life. Now it will become the central element, as he plans to run marathons, starting in Dingle this September and raise both money and the profile of his charity, the Liam Ryan Cancer Appeal.Liam said: "The appeal is being taken all over Ireland at various athletic events, the biggest of which this year is my first marathon, post cancer, in Dingle on September 1. Once it is established in Ireland I then intend to run marathons in the UK and US to take it the Irish diaspora abroad."I see it as a duty for me to broadcast my story - because my book is the one that I needed to read as a cancer victim back in 2002."My health is good now. I am 50 years of age and run 40 miles per week. But seven years ago, I was physically exhausted. I had to rebuild myself, re-learn how to talk, how to walk, how to eat. After the surgery, I could only open my mouth half an inch."Psychologically, I had to quickly realise that I had to fight this thing, that self-pity was not an option. I couldn't be a hard-lucky story - even if I did spend four months in a Liverpool hospital recovering from surgery, even if a holiday in the Canaries ended with me contacting meningitis and spending three weeks fighting for my life in a Spanish hospital."My story has to be told - because my story proves that there is a way back, that members of 'the club' (cancer victims) can draw power from one another. We can fight back and never look back. We can learn that day one - being told the news is the worst day because that is the day you go from 60 to 0 in seconds. You suffer tough moments. The point is, though, you come through them."www.liamryancancerappeal.weebly.com