Busy Hillsboro coach Erin Boss digs deep, survives cancer encounter

FESTUS, Mo. -- Erin Boss doesn't have time to have cancer.

The fourth-year volleyball coach at Hillsboro has a docile pit bull (Max) to love on, an educational career to further, her coaching of the Hawks to do, and a young marriage to Perryville football coach Blane Boss to grow.

Oh, and when she isn't on the run figuratively with all of those aspects of her life, the 34-year-old is on the run literally training for triathlons and marathons.

So when she was diagnosed in May of 2016 with Acute Promyelocytic Leukemia (APL), she was worried... because it was interrupting her life.

"They told me 35 days in the hospital," Boss said, "I started crying because I wasn't going to see my dogs (black lab Lovee was still in the picture at that point) for 35 days. How sad is it that was the first thing that came to my mind? I also didn't get to workout. But I didn't have a choice."

Boss will lead Hillsboro in the Dig For Life Volleyball Challenge today and Saturday.

A 'Lovee' of running

Boss "hated" running track as a student at Herculean and only did it one year. The sports of volleyball and basketball were more fun than running in circles.

"I hated to run," Boss said. "I loved playing sports, but in track, there was no ball involved."

She played volleyball at St. Louis Community College- Meramec before finishing as a student at Central Missouri State, and it was there that she and Lovee (pronounced "love," but with an extra "e") set foot (and paw) on a path that has changed Boss' life.

She adopted Lovee, who needed to shed some weight and the two began to take runs together.

"Until her last couple of years," Boss said of Lovee, who has now passed away, "she could go as far as I would let her. She was obsessed, so we kind of worked well together."

The two ran daily, and Lovee helped Boss train for her first marathon in April 2009.

Boss began to find races throughout the area to run and set a goal to run a marathon in all 50 states. She has now completed 25 marathons in 22 states.

All of the traveling and running is challenging to track, so she put Blane in charge of the record-keeping -- and the driving.

Blane once coached a football game on a Friday before getting in the car and driving Erin through the night to a race in Indiana that kicked-off early Saturday.

The couple slept in the car for a few hours that evening before Erin awoke to run the race, and Blane went back to the car and slept some more.

"He always says 'Man, we have to go again,'" Erin said of her hobby. "I always tell him 'You knew what you were getting yourself into.'"

Hillsboro volleyball coach Erin Boss speaks with her team during a match at Jackson Thursday.
Tom Davis ~ Tdavis@semoball.com

Crazy schedule

To fit everything into her day, Boss wakes before 4 a.m. and starts with a workout. If she was getting to bed at an early hour, that wouldn't seem so insane, but no educator-plus-coach gets to bed early in the season.

"Five hours is usually good for me," Boss said.

What has complicated her existence over the past year is she had a running partner peer-pressure her into training for triathlons.

"I'm a marathon runner," Boss said. "I have 50 states I need to complete. That is what I'm doing. I don't swim. I don't even own a bike."

She does now.

Her schedule has to not only include time to train for marathons (as well as fulfill every other obligation in her life), she also now has to train for triathlons.

"It's been a struggle," Boss said. "I'm going to have to sit down and actually plan something out."

The young couple had enjoyed a picture-perfect existence to that point.

They were engaged in the summer of 2015 and had the dogs and successful careers. There wasn't much to complain about.

Worn down

Any physician will tell you that being active will keep you healthy. For Erin, it gave her indications that probably saved her life.

She wasn't a person who goes to a doctor for check-ups, after all, that would be a sign of weakness.

Boss competed in the Kentucky Derby Marathon in Louisville and ran poorly. The performance didn't just cause her concern, it infuriated her.

"I started crying because I had trained so hard," Boss said. "I was expecting a PR and I didn't get it. I was so upset with myself."

Two days later, she attacked her training even harder, which wasn't smart.

She took off for a run with a group and struggled, while the next day, she couldn't even finish the training run.

"I was like 'I'm tired because I have a marathon and I'm tapering. It's fine.'"

Her body wasn't "fine."

She had developed APL, which attacks the white blood cells. While this was happening, she was physically pushing herself to an extreme degree.

Freezing and feeling weak at school, she had trouble staying awake in the classroom one day and decided to see her physician.

"The students were saying 'Coach, are you OK?'" Boss said. "I told them 'I'm not feeling well today, so just be good today.'"

Her doctor gave her a Z-pack, which helped, and she thought that was the end of it. But her medical journey was far from over; in fact, it was just beginning.

"I was just kind of numb"

A day after her doctor visit, her phone rang while she was coaching track. It was her physician and he thought he had seen a potential blood clot in her lung, so he told her to get to an emergency room.

Boss wanted to finish coaching first, but her fellow coaches were adamant that she leave.

"They basically kicked me out of practice," Boss said.

She had an array of tests run and first heard the words that truly sent chills through her.

"They said there was nothing else they could do," Boss said. "They said that I had to go see an oncologist.

"I knew that word."

Boss' grandfathers both had cancer, so she understood the severity of what was happening.

"I was just kind of numb," Boss said. "I didn't really know what to think. Like, 'Me?'"

Boss was banned from finishing the school year, which frustrated her to no end. However, she had neutropenia (low white blood count) and a virus could be life-threatening.

"It was the end of school," Boss said. "I had finals to get ready for."

A PET scan had been scheduled for her, but it wouldn't be performed for a week. When she called her mother with that information, she wasn't accepting that.

She called St. Johns Hospital in Washington, Missouri. and they got her in for a scan the next day, and that night she received news that she was in serious trouble.

"I was sitting on the deck reading a book," Boss recalled through tears, "my oncologist called and said that I needed to get to (Barnes-Jewish Hospital) and be admitted.

"He said 'You have cancer.'"

Dealing with it

She and Blane took a moment and "cried together," but then "it was: 'We have to go.'"

It was determined that her type of cancer was APL, which was "the jackpot" of leukemias, because it was treatable, though it hadn't been just a few years earlier.

Boss spent the next month-plus undergoing treatment, but she didn't stop exercising. Sort of.

The neurotic Boss would walk laps through the hospital and rode a stationary bike in the exercise room until it broke.

"I'm the strong one," Boss said of her attitude. "I can't show weakness."

She battled the disease well, but there were days she endured excruciating pain following blood transfusions.

"There were some days where I literally couldn't get out of bed," Boss said. "I had such bad bone pain. I could feel it coming on."

The finish line

She eventually made it out of the hospital and even kept her hair (for the most part).

Boss continued to have daily chemo treatments through the following months, but that didn't keep her from running in a 5K (which was set up for her benefit) or serving as the volleyball coach at Hillsboro, a position that she had accepted in March.

"It wasn't fair to the girls (if I missed time)," Boss said. "If I expected them to be there, then I should be there."

She and Blane were married that October (during a week she wasn't scheduled for chemo treatment) and in true Boss fashion, Blane coached football the night before, while Erin attended -- but didn't coach -- a Hawk match ON her wedding day.

"I didn't sit on the bench," Boss said. "I just went. I wanted to watch them play."

She received her last chemo treatment on New Year's Eve that year and had her port removed the following February.

Boss resumed training shortly thereafter and ran her first "post-cancer" marathon in April 2017.

She now has only annual check-ups, and signs are she is healthy as ever.

"I make sure that I spend time with the people that are worth it to me," Boss said of her outlook on life today. "I try not to waste time on things that aren't worth it.

"I used to dwell on a lot of things, now I don't."

She is too busy with life to be distracted by insignificant things; things such as cancer.

Dig for Life Volleyball Challenge

Friday

Pool play

* (at Show Me Center, Southeast Student Recreation Center, Cape Girardeau Sportsplex), Matches start at 4:30 p.m., 5:20 p.m., 6:10 p.m., 7 p.m., 7:50 p.m., 8:40 p.m. at all locations

Saturday

Pool play

* (at Show Me Center, Southeast Student Recreation Center, Cape Girardeau Sportsplex), Matches start at 8 a.m., 8:50 a.m., 9:40 a.m.

Black Division

Gold bracket

First round

* (at Show Me Center, Southeast Student Recreation Center), 1:30 p.m.

Quarterfinals

* (at Sports Plex, Southeast Student Recreation Center), 3:30 p.m.

Semifinals

* (at Southeast Student Recreation Center), 4:30 p.m.

Championship

* (at Southeast Student Recreation Center), 5:30 p.m.

Silver bracket

First round

* (at Cape Girardeau Sportsplex, Southeast Student Recreation Center), 1:30 p.m., 2:30 p.m., 3:30 p.m.

Quarterfinals

* (at Cape Girardeau Sportsplex, Southeast Student Recreation Center), 3:30 p.m., 4:30 p.m.

Semifinals

* (at Cape Girardeau Sportsplex, Southeast Student Recreation Center), 5:30 p.m.

Championship

* (at Southeast Student Recreation Center), 6:30 p.m.

RED DIVISION

Gold bracket

First round

* (at Show Me Center, Southeast Student Recreation Center, Show Me Center), 2:30 p.m.

Quarterfinals

* (at Southeast Student Recreation Center, Show Me Center), 4:30 p.m.

Semifinals

* (at Show Me Center), 5:30 p.m.

Championship

* (at Show Me Center), 6:30 p.m.

Silver bracket

Quarterfinals

* (at Southeast Student Recreation Center, Show Me Center), 3:30 p.m.

Semifinals

* (at Southeast Student Recreation Center), 5:30 p.m.

Championship

* (at Show Me Center), 6:30 p.m.

Red Division

Pool A: Northwest H.S., Arcadia Valley, Summersville, Saxony Lutheran

Pool B: Dexter, Central (Park Hills), Seckman, Eminence

Pool C: Parkway South, Bloomfield, St. Vincent, Lesterville

Pool D: Leopold, Farmington, Notre Dame (STL), Kennett

Pool E: Ste. Genevieve, Winona, Perryville, Scott City

Pool F: Hillsboro, Woodland, Notre Dame (CG), New Haven

Black Division

Pool G: Cape Girardeau Central, Caruthersville, Senath, Capital City

Pool H: Campbell, Calvary Lutheran, Zalma, Cooter

Pool J: Clarkton, De Soto, Doniphan, East Prairie

Pool K: Hazelwood West, Gideon, Twin Rivers, Clearwater

Pool L: Grandview, Oran, Bunker, Portageville

Pool M: Green Ridge, Malden, Viburnum, Puxico

Pool N: Greenville, Jefferson, Southland, Sikeston

Pool O: Holcomb, Oak Ridge, South Iron, Risco

Pool P: Ellington, New Madrid County Central, Meadow Heights, Richland