(Photo courtesy of Jonathan Simmons)
When Jothy Rosenberg was 16 years old his knee locked up while he was jumping rope in gym class. “My dad was a surgeon and told me, ’Big guys hurt their knees.’ He wrapped me in an ace bandage and said to try and take it easy.”
For a few months Jothy’s knee did seem to get better, until he had another fall. That’s when his parents, both of whom were physicians, thought it might be serious.
Their worst fears were confirmed when a biopsy showed that Jothy had a rare for of bone cancer, Osteogenic sarcoma. “The next day my leg was amputated. At the time [35-years ago] there was no chemotherapy, so that’s the treatment I got.”
Until then Jothy had always been a star athlete. He had set Michigan state records in swimming, and was an expert skier. So it was only natural that after his surgery he asked his doctors and family: “So what can I do?” Meaning, what kinds of sports can I do? Jothy quickly realized: “No one had a clue. We were in uncharted waters and I’d have to figure this out by myself.”
But first he’d have to figure out how to walk.
“I had lost strength and balance and I couldn’t even stand up. It was quite a while before I had the confidence to try sports.” Once Jothy regained his confidence he decided to climb every hill on Mt. Desert Isle. With crutches. “I had blisters and was bleeding from using the crutches. Then I realized I needed to use athletic tape and moleskin. Eventually I did every peak except for Cadillac Mountain.”
Emboldened, Jothy decided to resume swimming “But first I had to figure out how not to go in circles.” From there it was back to the ski slopes, “Which was tough without an outrigger [an assistive device]. But I realized I could do things if I worked hard at it.”
Three-years later, while Jothy was in college, his cancer returned. This time it had spread to his lungs. “I thought I’d been given a death sentence,” Jothy recalled. “But chemotherapy had just been invented at Dana Farber and I survived.”
At that point, Jothy’s motto became, carpe diem: “I dropped out of school and became a ski bum. I also learned how to play 1-legged volleyball and to kayak.” Almost every sport, it seemed, except for biking.
Twelve years ago, Jothy sponsored a participant in the Boston to NY AIDS Ride. “I was bragging to a friend about how far she was biking. He [that friend] told me, ’I can see you’re excited, it’s a shame you can’t do that bike ride.’”
“That night I bought a bike.”