Making it to the top of the hill. Together.
Meet the Splitstones
It took 15 years and two cancer diagnoses for Don and Stacy Splitstone to meet. But when they did, their lives both changed forever.
Stacy is the Chief Accounting Officer at UPMC. In late 2008, not long after moving to Pittsburgh from Atlanta, she was diagnosed with Stage 2 Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. Stacy began treatment at UPMC Hillman Cancer Center in December, finishing her chemotherapy and radiation in August 2009.
That summer her sister-in-law decided to show support for Stacy’s journey by joining the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society and running a half-marathon in Stacy’s honor. “I was inspired,” Stacy recalls, “but also really angry—not at cancer, not at anyone. I was angry at my body. ‘Why did you do this? I’m in my mid-thirties. I’m supposed to be strong.” As a way of regaining some measure of control, Stacy decided to join the Society.
A sprinter in high school who’d never considered running more than a half-mile, Stacy ran several half-marathons to raise money. “Then in 2010,” she says, “a group of runners said, ‘we’re going to do a century bike ride with the LLS.’ They talked me into it, and I started training in January 2011. LLS provides coaches for endurance events. Don was one of my coaches. That’s how we met.”