03.03.07
Constant battle
Constant battleOriginally uploaded by andynoise.
Constant battle
Sanchez guides Arvin’s wrestlers while fighting colon cancer
BY MASON KELLEY , Californian staff writer
e-mail: masonkelley@bakersfield.com | Friday, Mar 2 2007 11:20 PM
Last Updated: Friday, Mar 2 2007 11:25 PM
Miguel Sanchez breaks down.
Photos:
Photo by John Harte/The Californian
With a catheter and pump sending chemotherapy into his body, Arvin High wrestling coach Miguel Sanchez will be there for his wrestlers as they compete in the state championships this weekend at Rabobank Arena.
The Arvin High wrestling coach swats away a tear as if it were a fly disturbing a peaceful scene on a summer afternoon.
He hates to show weakness.
But remembering that day back in early December, that day that helped him briefly forget about the colon cancer, the surgery to remove the tumor and the chemotherapy catches him off-guard.
Sitting in a chair in one corner of the Arvin High wrestling room, Sanchez shields his face so his wrestlers don’t see the trickle of tears running down his face.
***
It’s early December and Arvin High is preparing for the Coyote Classic.
Sanchez, 33, discovers that both Frankie Castillo and Efrain Sanchez are scheduled to wrestle at 135 pounds.
Castillo offers to go up and wrestle at 140 pounds, so Efrain, Miguel’s younger brother, can stay at 135.
“Man, that’s two weights above your weight,” Miguel tells Castillo.
Miguel agrees to let Castillo make the jump, thinking to himself, “He’s going to get killed.”
But Castillo wins. Efrain wins, too.
Now, back in the corner of Arvin’s wrestling room, Miguel tries to collect his thoughts. He tries to find the words to explain how much that moment meant. The words don’t come easy, leaking out between gasps as his wrestlers warm up for practice.
“I had chemo that week. — It went by fast. — As you sit there at the chemo center — you see a lot of jacked-up people. — That week — those moments when Efrain won and Frankie won — and not only them, everyone wrestled good. — But I think what Frankie did, to go to 40s so (Efrain) could wrestle — Those moments are what made chemo go by fast. You sit there and you’re getting this stuff pumped into you and it’s just killing you. You sit there and you think about that. You think about those moments and it makes it worth it.”
***
In 2004, the Bears’ freshmen wrestling team struggles so much, Miguel thinks he’s developing an ulcer.
“I remember telling them, ‘I yelled at you guys so much, you literally gave me ulcers,’” he says.
Without health insurance, he ignores the pain. He’s just decided his team needs to wrestle all year to improve and there isn’t time to be bothered by an upset stomach.
“The sad thing is, when you don’t have insurance, they don’t care about you,” Miguel says.
With the aid of some pills he got in Mexico, the pain subsides.
But a few pills don’t stop the tumor’s growth. For two years, the tumor continues to grow until the pain returns two years later on Cinco De Mayo.
Miguel calls to say he is going to miss practice. Since he is working as a DJ at PLAY 103.9, he has insurance and visits the doctor.
“Had I not had insurance, I might have found out too late,” Miguel says.
When he receives a call from his doctor at 5 p.m. on a Friday, he prepares himself for the bad news.
“The next thing you know, I was on the operating table,” Miguel says.
The surgery goes well, but doctors find some lingering cancer cells. After spending a month away from his team, Miguel thinks “it’s over,” but he finds out he needs to go through chemotherapy.
The first thing Miguel asks is, “Can I wait until after the season?”
But with cancer there is no time to wait. He starts chemotherapy in November.
Through it all, though, Miguel stays with his team.
He goes through chemotherapy — a cancer treatment using chemical agents that selectively destroy malignant cells and tissues — three times a week every other week. He DJs in the morning, makes it to practice and, sometimes, DJs at a club at night.
Miguel stays so busy he never takes time for himself.
No girlfriends. No trips to happy hour. His focus, despite everything he’s been through, remains with his team.
The chemo zaps the 33-year-old’s strength. There are days he wants to quit.
But he won’t.
He can’t.
“How can I quit when I tell these guys not to quit? They didn’t (quit) for four years,” Miguel says. “They’ve been here every day. That’s what makes me keep going.”
That’s why, even on days he should be in bed, Miguel is with his team.
At the Lemoore Bash, Miguel falls asleep on the mat. At the Doc Buchanan, the whole day is a battle.
But the days when the cancer wins are few and far between.
His wrestlers keep him going.
“Having them win, for a little while you forget you have cancer,” Miguel says.
***
It’s two days before the CIF State Wrestling Championships and Miguel is working his team on the mats at Bakersfield College.
Arvin’s four state qualifiers — Efrain, Castillo, Edgar Diaz and Luis Tomayo — are in the middle of a 10-minute workout timed by a stopwatch that dangles from Miguel’s neck.
But when looking at the coach, it’s not the stopwatch that sticks out. It’s not the San Diego Padres hat that hides his black hair that is thinning because of the chemotherapy. It’s not the Aéropostale jacket or the red-and-white gloves he’s wearing.
What stands out is the small fanny pack slung around his neck. A thin tube runs from the pack under the jacket and up to his shoulder.
While he’s preparing his wrestlers for the biggest moment of the year, he’s going through chemotherapy.
Miguel lifts up his shirt to show where the tube meets his shoulder, revealing a scar that runs vertically down his stomach.
Most people in Miguel’s situation would give up. They would entrust the team to the assistant coaches and focus on the cancer.
But Miguel doesn’t.
Through a boombox on a desk on the far side of the gym, Bone Crusher’s raspy voice is rapping, “I ain’t never scared. I ain’t never scared.”
If Miguel is scared, he doesn’t show it. He keeps fighting for his team and for his life.
“It gives me a lot of motivation, just because he’s my brother and everything,” Efrain says. “I try to push it out there. I know my brother’s suffering, too. I see him, and he’s not there. That makes me feel bad. I’m glad that he’s out here, but sometimes I feel like telling him just to go home.”
Efrain never tells his brother to go home, though, because he knows Miguel won’t leave.
***
It’s Friday morning and Miguel is tired. He’s fighting a headache and nausea. But with Diaz wrestling Brentwood-Liberty’s Paul Gomez, Miguel is focused.
“Hey, listen to me,” Sanchez shouts in the second period.
“Watch it. Watch it. Watch it,” Miguel adds in the third period. “Hips down.”
Diaz finishes the match with a 9-2 victory and it’s off to the next match.
Castillo, after pinning his first opponent in 5 minutes, 16 seconds, is wrestling against Vacaville’s Taylor Hodel in the second round. He falls behind 12-4 in the second period before rallying for a second pin in 5:30.
“I want to make the state final, because my coach has cancer and me and Efrain are almost like brothers because we’re best friends,” Castillo says. “I want to try to make it happen. Miguel has never had someone in the state final.
“He’s a really good coach and he pushes us. He pushes us to the limit where we’re tired and we want to give in, but we just hang in and that makes us tougher. Watching him go through this, he’s different now.”
The senior falls in his next match to Barstow’s Donovan Barela and wins just one consolation match before picking up his second loss to eliminate him from the tournament.
***
The season ends Friday — all of Arvin’s wrestlers fall on the first day — giving Miguel a chance to focus on his health. He has a few more months of chemotherapy and a decision to make.
He isn’t sure if he will return to coaching next year.
He wants to be able to go to happy hour, maybe even find a girlfriend. But there is a pull, a link to wrestlers like Diaz, who will be a senior next year.
“I have to see what my health is going to be like,” Miguel says. “I don’t know if I’m going to be alive. I have cancer and I’m fighting it, but I don’t know what tomorrow’s going to be like. I’ll take it one day at a time.”
No matter what happens, though, Miguel is always going to remember that moment in December, a moment that makes it OK for a tough guy to break down.
