Pat Murphy, Kerry's international masters' race walker, visited St Brendan's AC walkers in January 2023. He delivered an insightful hour of tips and to-dos to both adults and juveniles. He gave an exhibition of racewalking. A week later, he became the first athlete to win the walks section of the club's Tom Kelly 8K. He did it all with a smile and locals watching were amazed at his power and speed.
On Monday, March 27th, 2023, Pat competed in the World Masters Indoor Championships in the beautiful town of Torun in Poland. He toed the line in the M60 category. I was just after finishing my race and had a close-up trackside view of his 15 lap 3000m event. He was up against athletes who had a few years advantage on him but moved through the field in the second half with power and grace. As Pat Murphy does. Finished in the top eight. Four days later, he competed in the road race walk on the streets of Torun and produced a similar performance. Yellow headgear, green singlet of Ireland that he has worn on many occasions, reflective trademark sunnies, number 1784 on his chest, powerful arm action and massive stride. Heel to toe with a youthful bounce at over sixty years of age. A joy to watch in full flight.
A few weeks later he was on his way to University Hospital Kerry in an ambulance after suffering a severe stroke.
Now on Christmas Eve 2023, Pat Murphy is back home after eight months in hospitals in Cork, UHK and Dún Laoghaire. It has been a spring, summer, autumn and winter like never before for the champion race walker from Castleisland. A life-changing period of time.
Stroke
“The day before the stroke, I was back in Banna and I did 10 X 1 mile racewalks” says Pat now as he recovers at home at last. He did 7:50 minutes per mile in those intervals on the eternal sands of Banna on that Sunday last April.
The following day changed his life. He put on his training gear at home on that Monday morning, went to the toilet and then ran for the door on his way to Banna for another walk with the dog. A recovery walk this time. “I felt great” he says.
Then bang. Speech slurred and down he went. Emergency 999 was dialled by his sister and he was quickly taken to University Hospital Kerry in Tralee. “I blanked out totally there”. He thinks he may have got a mini-stroke the night before and the follow-up major stroke in the morning, but he’s unsure of that.
Cork
He has no memory of being taken to Cork UH from Tralee. He was within the borders of shadowland. Spent three hours on the operating table where the surgeons attempted to free the pathways in the brain. A rod was pushed through the artery in an attempt to break the clot.
He spent a week in Cork and then returned by ambulance to Tralee. They had no solution to his question in Cork when he became conscious. “How did I get this thing?” The doctors did tell him that “only for he was so fit, he was dead”.
The Devil Didn’t Want You!
Back in his beloved Kingdom, he settled in to the stroke unit in UHK, a physio told him “Pat, the Devil didn’t want you and God didn’t want you! Cork didn’t want you either, so they fecked you across the border to us here in Tralee”. Humour is never far away from Pat, even in adversity. Especially in adversity. He knew that he was going to be in good company in UHK. This prevented him from drifting too far from the shore.
Then the realities started hitting home. He had “claw fingers” in his left hand when he woke up in Tralee. The fingers were frozen in a claw position after the stroke. That had to be sorted out to avoid further damage. They had to be opened and exercised.
Then he had to re-learn how to chew. Most people when they hear of a stroke’s effects think only of one half of the body as arm and foot. There can also be half the other organs.
“I got the three shit things” says Pat honestly: “I got the paralysed left hand and arm, the paralysed left leg and the right side of my brain got shattered”. Some get away with a blip after a stroke. Pat got the works.
He was in Tralee from the first of May till the twenty sixth of September. “The whole summer” and he had already spent a week in Cork. A challenging time, including the visit of Covid to the ward on six occasions. That meant lockdown. No contact with family. No visits by friends. No colleagues. Isolation.
How did it affect Pat? “Not a bit in the world!” because Pat is a fighter. A survivor. He had a famous Kerry footballer and manager in the bed beside him for a while and he was a kindred spirit. The doctor asked the companion “how did you get on with the Covid?” and the companion said “What’s that!”
Blessed and obsessed.
He challenged Pat to get off his chair once and chided him that he could be stuck in it for quite a while. Pat responded “If it takes me all night, I’m going to get off this feckin chair!” And it did. And he did!
How did Pat cope with the inevitable frustration that built up with the loss of his limbs and his freedom? The lowest point psychologically for the Castleisland man was that first week in UHK. It hit him like a runaway truck that “Oh, my God, my walking is gone, my plumbing business is gone, my driving is gone”.
Then he met the challenge head on and was pleased “to be alive, barely alive, but alive”.
Already the road ahead was forming in his heart and mind. “Keep pushing, keep pushing is what I told myself. That’s all. Keep pushing. Keep pushing”.
Resilience
“Always to be the best in the class” is what he wanted. “To be the best in the class no matter what the class was” he says firmly and with a dash of humorous satisfaction. A characteristic learned from life and from his days competing in race walking championships from county to international. “I wanted to get a bit better all the whole time while I was in Tralee. To get my hand and my leg a little bit better. That was my whole reason for trying every day”.
The little annoying things that bothered Pat for a time included the restriction when using his mobile phone. With only his right hand in use, he found it challenging to text or call. He was not used to holding the phone and using his thumb with the same hand and there were more phone-falls than phone calls. Then, with his left eye having restricted sight, the left hand side of the phone page was difficult to read.
He observed a few patients in Tralee who gave up when the hills to climb became overbearing. They threw in the towel. One man took to the bed in frustration because he had lost his speech after being hit by the stroke. Couldn’t communicate and opted out under the strain.
He is full of praise for the staff in UHK also. Considering that the facilities they have for stroke patients in the hospital can’t compare to Dun Leary, the physios and nurses are are absolutely brilliant”.
When I visited Pat in UHK in the middle of a summer day, he was in great form, looking out at the northern slopes of Sliabh Mis drenched in sunshine. When we talked about race walking, he raised his crutch and exclaimed “I’ll beat anyone else with a crutch in race walking!” with that glint of devilment in his eye. The Pat Murphy devilment that defines him as a competitor and a super-positive human being.
At that stage, his immediate aim was to get up to the National Rehabilitation Hospital in Dún Laoghaire. That would be a massive step forward in his recovery. Looking forward only.
Race Walking Success
Pat Murphy has been a major figure in the sport of race walking for decades. He has represented Ireland on numerous occasions in many countries and has rewrote national record books at will over the years. When he joined the masters ranks, he immediately made an impact. He won a silver medal in 2002 in the M40 category at the world championships. The year 2004 saw him compete in the Pan American Games in Puerto Rico and a double success there on the track and road. In 2007, he won two silver medals in the European Masters championships in Helsinki, clocking superlative times. The list goes on.
But the past was laid aside for the moment in the autumn of 2023 as Pat got his immediate wish. A place in Dún Laoghaire.
Dún Laoghaire
The Kerry walker then spent twelve weeks in Dún Laoghaire. Different from Tralee, “like a hotel”. Built like a hotel with massive single rooms. Everyone had their own private room, bath, shower and the lot. They would normally get up about 8.30am and then had a variety of disciplines after breakfast. Physio, speech and language and the gym downstairs with weights and all equipment. They have the most modern weights in Ireland in Pat’s opinion. The advice on how to use them was also of the top order as the physios supplied personal advice to each guest. Then they did carpentry and horticulture. Then there were sessions of group therapy and group activities.
There was also a shop downstairs in the facility and a chapel in the old part of the building so all needs were catered for.
Table tennis was played for reflex and eyesight development. The classes lasted about forty minutes, all day long till 6pm.
Pat would be instructed by about forty or more people in a day, with six staff in the gym and four in the pool. Pat is not a swimmer but the pool is for relaxation as well as physical rehabilitation. Pat’s left hand was handing by his side for eight months with fierce pressure on the shoulder. So the sessions in the pool enabled him to put his arms in a horizontal position on the water and meant great relief. Pat will incorporate the water exercise in his future training.
The biggest physical challenge to Pat in his rehabilitation was to reacquire balance. “Balance was the hardest by miles” he says. In his wheelchair he had to perform a number of exercises with the help of two physios and they would help “to straighten you up”. A huge exercise was standing up and sitting down, a simple task for the majority of people in their daily lives but a mountain to climb for stroke victims. The fact that Pat had only one arm to come to his aid was an extra challenge. “Some people had two arms to use, but I had only one!” he comments.
The age range of the guests in Dun Leary spanned from teens to seventies. Many of the younger guests had car accident injuries which were quite acute. There is one ward for spinal injuries for people who might not be able to walk for some time again. “Some of the injuries I saw were frightening compared to mine!” says Pat. He wasn’t aware of any other top masters sportsperson there in his term as a guest.
“There was loads of food and loads of entertainment” he jokes. There were singsongs, music and film nights. “Halloween was a great oul craic” he laughs.
The stay in Dun Leary fulfilled all Pat’s expectations. “In the last week there, I made deadly progress” he affirms. His physio was of massive assistance “and I found him great. He was a pusher and it was all drive on by him! I enjoyed that attitude”.
Unfortunately there was no plumbing done there, as “the oul hands were taking a break!”
In Dún Laoghaire, he underwent music therapy and he loved it. He was able to move with the rhythms and communicate well with his body. He re-learned the key element of balance.
Another huge hope already realised is in the craft of carpentry. Having the hands of a plumber, with massive physical intelligence, Pat was given the opportunity of doing carpentry in Dún Laoghaire. He was in the carpentry class with one hand and one leg, in a wheelchair, and he began to craft wood. “There were other fellas beside me with two hands and two legs and an OT (occupational therapist) with them, and they kept feckin mouthing and complaining rather than trying to make something!” Pat says with a laugh. Pat would chide them and say “lads, will ye stop your complaining, just close your eyes and pull like a dog!”
Quoting our Olympic heroes from West Cork. His heroes. The OTs actually asked him to put a bit of discipline on the slow-movers, as he could say things to them that the OTs couldn’t.
No time for plámásing with Pat around. The OTs arranged with Pat that he would be the one to put discipline on anyone who was falling behind. One day two young fellas in wheelchairs came in late to the woodwork class and made excuses that they were held up by visitors to their room. Pat immediately deflated them by saying “For feck sake lads, ye had no visitors…ye are after being in the café, look at the coffee cups at the side of yeer chairs. Don’t be telling feckin lies!”
Or as Bob Dylan sang “You’d better start swimming or you’ll sink like a stone”…
The OT said to Pat that he had mental independence despite the physical limitations and he was able to innovate with half his limbs under restricted conditions. That’s Pat Murphy’s courage.
It wasn’t easy, mind you. He would have a piece of wood in his hand and he would be working away at it when suddenly it would slip from his hand and fly across the floor. Feckin-time “Road rage would be no problem after those experiences!” But he would chase the piece of wood, grab it again and restart. Not doing was not an option for the Kerry man.
Pat made a stool eventually, using a vice as best he could. And he could. He asked for green and gold rope (as a Kerry person would) to put a súgán seat on it, but they said no one had ever asked for those colours before. Order some in immediately was Pat’s request.
He intends to make more of these stools and they will be collectors’ items undoubtedly. Seats of learning. Seats of re-learning even.
Leaving Dún Laoghaire
When Pat was leaving Dun Leary a few weeks ago, the nurses openly told him that they would miss him. They would miss his humour and his positivity and especially they would miss the strains of “Come Out You Black and Tans” by the Wolfe Tones coming from his room as they approached him on their visits. “There were tears when I was leaving” he quietly adds. Not just tears from Pat either.
Home for Christmas
At home now, Pat has programme supplied by Dún Laoghaire and has been supplied with contact numbers and can get in touch if required.
Pat missed his race walking. The training in Banna where the sea air is invigorating and where the sands of time know his powerful stride. He had paid to go to the European Games in Helsinki last summer. Racewalking. That plan was scuppered by Mr Stroke. “When I saw the results and realised that I would have won the M60 walk easily, that made things worse for a while. But only for a while.” No need to increase burdens. Trave the road of life lightly.
He misses the plumbing too. It was his living but more than that, he so loved plumbing. The nature of the career, the logic of it, the sense it made, the challenges it placed before him every day…Pat was born for plumbing. And walking. He misses the freedom of driving his van also. Hop in the van, drive out to Banna or wherever he wanted. Stop in Ardfert or wherever he wanted. Drive in to An Ríocht to deliver a fitness session or burn the track with his blistering pace. He misses all his customers from work and all his many pals in sport. That independence is gone for the moment.
But his time in Dún Laoghaire taught him that he is one of the lucky ones. Some stroke survivors can’t even scratch their noses or wipe their eyes yet and have to work long and hard at those tasks. That’s the reality for some but there are ways and means to recovery.
The frightening fact about stoke, Pat says, is that 33 million people per year worldwide die from the affliction. In Ireland, it is now the third biggest killer next to cancer and heart attacks. And age is not the issue. Men between 50 and 55 are in the danger category. Pat estimates that many more men than women were seen by him as victims over this summer of 2023.
Despite science and medicine, much of the brain is still a mystery, he says.
The mystery behind the causes are frightening too.
The four usual causes of strokes are cigarette-smoking, alcohol abuse, obesity and stress. Pat didn’t come under any of those headings so the mystery factor was the one that hit him. “I never drank a pint in my life and I never smoked a fag” he states. Olympic gold medallist Michael Johnson was struck down a few years ago similarly, despite the fact that he didn’t come under the endangered headings. A clean-living athlete. Same as Pat.
Walking on with hope
Talking to his hand
Pat’s courage will ensure he walks on, if not physically for the time being, then spiritually. He has the gym booked in An Ríocht’s excellent facility to deliver his famous fitness programme after Christmas. “If I can’t do the exercises myself, I can give out plenty guff!” he assures us. In fact, he will be able to keep an eye on his students more effectively from now on. Last year, some of his troupe would hide behind his back while he was doing the bridges and the planks himself! Since he won’t be doing the exercises himself for the moment, he can keep a sharper eye on anyone who’s not doing the proper drill! It’s an ill wind…
His ambitions for his left leg is that he will be able to move out of the brace which supports and make it stronger. He hopes then that “some bit of life will come back into my left hand and arm”. But for the moment the brain cells are not cooperating.
The only help he can give the hand now is keep it safe and talk to it. Yes, Pat talks to his left hand. Using his knowledge of speech and language, he is advised that someday the brain may open up the shattered lines to the hand and one day he may see a twitch of “message received”. Hope that a new pathway will open up, or that the pathway that was there before will recreate itself. He calls it brain physio. Ask the hand questions. Look at it. Wait for an answer. Work. Work. Work. Hand, I love you. Talk to me.
If that one-way chat doesn’t happen, the brain will keep thinking that you don’t want to use your left hand anymore! It will think that you only need your right hand and it will make that stronger and ignore the other.
As well as talking to the left hand, Pat gives it little tasks to do. In the morning, he wedges his tube of toothpaste into that lifeless left hand to signal to it that he needs it. Same with jam jar covers. It tells the hand physically that he needs it back badly.
He has to be careful when washing also. As there is no sensation in the left hand, it won’t feel when water is freezing or scalding. Damage could be done to the skin before it could be realised.
So as long as he doesn’t damage the hand on the door of an elevator or going into a vehicle, that hope walks on. In the case of the left leg, he can walk with the aid but has to be very careful as tiredness can attack quickly and he could just fall down. And if he falls on the side of the left hand, it can do nothing to protect itself or him.
But his walking has improved and sometimes he can abandon the stick, if only for a while.
Pat’s pastimes include watching films. “I love the movies!” he says with enthusiasm. Of course he watches all sports and was watching Chelsea and Newcastle in the Caraboo Cup when I called him last week. “Not a great reader, though!” he adds.
I hope you read this, Pat!
And of course behind every good person, is another good person....Lorna was a vibrant source of support all the way, through all the eight months for Pat. A rock, a lighthouse, a love. A journey of any kind is rarely made alone. The journey that Pat travelled was lighted by Lorna. An uncomplicated and unsurprising support. A natural and strong presence that had never been doubted.
Sporting Dream
Pat’s sporting dream for the immediate future is to keep fit and be ready as his condition allows him. For the next challenge. Fitness saved him before. It might save him again.
Pat Murphy’s courage should be bottled and sold. It has the spirit of Christmas in it. The spirit of every day too.
There are very few people whose lives have not changed in some way during the year 2023. Or who are not connected to people whose lives have been altered. Some forever. We are all participants in an eternal game of change. Some say it keeps us honest. More say it keeps us reserved and subdued. We are defined by how we react. Life is what we make it. “Life is full of signs” says Abraham Verghese in his millions-selling book “Cutting For Stone” and he adds “The trick is to know how to read the signs”.
Pat Murphy has read the signs and is defined by his positivity in his life-changing eight months. He is a life-enthusiast. He speaks and acts after those challenging months like an honest cutting north west wind. He embraces life’s possibilities and threats. In the language of the Christmas season, he has undergone his flight into Egypt and now the darkest days are over and a new spring beckons for the not too distant future.
It is a form of grace. It is courage. It is Pat Murphy’s courage and, like grace, it can see us home.
