On kidney disease, fatherhood, marathons, and the journey back.
A little over a month ago, I found myself staring at a toilet bowl again. Not because. I was sick, but because I was looking for foam.
If you’ve never had kidney disease, that sentence probably sounds ridiculous. For me it became routine.
‘Here we go again.”
Every day carried a silent question. Is today the day? Will I relapse again?
For years that question thankfully grew quiet. I didn’t have to ask. False hope, as it turns out.
I was diagnosed with Minimal Change Disease in 2016. I relapsed frequently until September of 2020, then it went quiet.
I was in remission. Four and a half years of it. Life felt normal.
I got married. Built a career. Bought a home. Got a dog. Became a dad. Chased big goals. Ran a marathon in 2 hours and 53 minutes, securing a Boston Marathon qualifying time. I thought I was building momentum.
Recently, I realized I was building assumptions. I assumed remission would continue. I assumed by body would cooperate. I assumed the future I was building was guaranteed. I assumed I would just grow out of my disease and it would disappear.
Guess what?
None of those things were true.
As I am getting older, I am realizing more that life is rarely lived in certainty.
It’s lived in tension.
Tension between acceptance and ambition. Between good and poor health.
The tension between trusting God and desperately wanting answers.
The tension between who you are and who you could be.
I believe that the tension is right where I am supposed to be.
When my kidney disease returned in February 2025 after that four and a half year remission – I wanted resolution. I wanted healing, and to rid my body of the disease. I wanted a guarantee that the treatment would work this time. I wanted that to be my last relapse. I wanted a solution. A timeline perhaps.
What I got was more questions than answers. Two more relapses following the addition of a new medication. The current relapse that left me wrestling mentally and riddled with questions, and another – stronger treatment to decide upon. But somehow, I am hopeful, and thankful.
Would I relapse again?
Will I be able to run how I used to?
Will I ever feel normal?
Would I be the father I want to be?
Will God take this from me?
I still don’t know many of those answers. But maybe that’s the whole point.
Sure, I have been looking for answers I have never sought out. Assessing my records, allergens, lab work, my faith, my fitness, and trying to loosely connect any dots possible.
Sure there are connections, but ultimately – what do I know?
That I have an auto immune kidney disease that requires management long term. And that… I have finally accepted. And God may not take that away from me.
And that is okay. He is with me.
Which is more than enough.
One of the strangest things about suffering is how quickly it reveals what you have been trusting. I always thought I trusted God.
Then I realized how much I trusted predictability. Healthy lab tests. Medicine. Career Trajectories. I trusted an illusion that if I did everything right, things would either fall in my lap or unfold the way I wanted.
Then I get the reminder that control is mostly a story we tell ourselves.
—
Less than two years ago, I crossed the finish line of the Philadelphia marathon in 2:53. I remember feeling so proud.
Not because of the time.
Because of what it represented.
Because of my story.
Discipline. Consistency. Showing up every day to train, and train hard. Proving that hard work, works. Proving to myself I had ‘beat’ my kidney disease – or so I thought.
If I’m honest? I think the lessons I am learning are much deeper than anything I learned during that race. Running 26.2 miles at a 6:37 min/mile pace is difficult.
Trusting God when the future feels uncertain is difficult in a different way.
Holding your daughter while wondering what your health will look like in five years is difficult.
Showing up for your family when fear is louder than confidence is difficult.
I have been faced with hard things, but moving forward in life means facing these hard things head on.
My daughter wont remember these years of struggle. She wont remember the relapses, the medicines, the doctor appointments, the countless nights my wife has spent worrying about me.
She will experience the man these years are building.
The man I am becoming.
That has changed everything for me.
Maybe this disease isn’t simply happening to me.
Maybe it’s forming me.
Teaching me patience. Teaching me resilience in the face of adversity. Teaching me to be dependent upon God, even in a valley that may or may not end.
Teaching me that strength comes from above, and it isn’t always found pushing harder.
Sometimes strength looks like staying faithful when nothing feels certain.
This is for those living in that tension. Anyone caring a weight they didn’t ask for. A diagnosis. A disappointment. A failure. Fear.
I don’t have a formula, or answers for that matter.
What I have is a story still being written.
A faith growing, and stronger than ever, in the bottom of a valley. Even in the valleys, life can be meaningful.
We don’t begin with victory, or certainty, but with tension.
Living in the midst of the tension.
LP
Logan Pethel 
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