On the “road unpaved” with Ironman competitor and author Risa August

By Brianna Corrine

With tinsel in her hair and a hopeful outlook of what lies on the road ahead, Risa August is a paragon of what it means to take the unfortunate and turn it into something positive.

In 2018, August, an incredibly well-rounded athlete with several Ironman competitions and triathlons under her belt, was diagnosed with acromegaly, a rare disease that pushed her to face an onslaught of issues, including those that had been brewing in her 18-year marriage, her perception of herself, and the future she envisioned.

Since her initial diagnosis, she has devoted her life to drawing attention to rare pituitary diseases and to proving that life doesn’t have to end when things look bleaker than ever. During that time August also, remarkably, biked down the Pacific Coast from Canada to Mexico over six weeks, a feat in its own right that served as a backdrop in the memoir she was writing. “I couldn’t even fathom what people would gain from it,” says August, author of “The Road Unpaved: Border to Border with a Brain Tumor and a Bike.”

With candor, humor, and incredible rawness, August shares her journey, thus far, of dealing with the disease in which the pituitary gland produces large amounts of growth hormone that can result in additional ailments. As an introvert, August has been shocked by the impact of her book. From people who share her disease to those who are athletes, it is undeniable that August has provided inspiration.

August was thrilled to have so many people connect with her journey.

“I always wanted to write a book, but this isn’t what I had in mind,” she says. “I actually have been wanting to write a book since my twenties, but it was going to be about other people’s stories, it wasn’t going to be my story. So when I pulled out my bucket list following diagnosis and began looking at my life and reflecting on it, I was like, it’s time to start doing the things I always wanted to do, the things I’d put on the back burner. So I was like, this is the story, this is my book. And that’s how that evolved.”

As romantic as it sounds to be a writer working on a first book, August divulges that it was“excruciating.”

“It’s interesting because everyone tells you, ‘Write the story for you. Don’t write it for others.’ But it’s so challenging. I have always been a people pleaser. I always wanted to make everyone else in the world happy, except myself,” she reveals. “So I was constantly like, ‘Oh, but what if people take this the wrong way.’ I had a lot of insecurities around it. It had to be perfect. So the new me, the person wanting to tell my story, and the old rigid me were kind of at odds. Thankfully I had a brilliant editor who was so good at helping me weed through all of that.”

When it comes to writing, especially about something as personal as one’s health, there’s the question of how it serves to benefit the writer on a therapeutic level. August says, “It was really painful to revisit a lot of that stuff and maybe even acknowledge some of it; acknowledging who I used to be. You know I was a bit of an asshole, not on purpose. I just thought I was doing life the right way and that everyone else should do it the same way.”

Although sharing her story was therapeutic, she said, “You still have to go through the dark to get to the light.”

In a moment of vulnerability and with a visible spike in emotion, August shares that after writing her book and making the jump to test her limits with the knowledge of her diagnosis, “I used to focus on what I couldn’t do or what I wouldn’t be good at.”

She stressed how in the moment she was anxious about whether anyone would even read the book or if she would be able to write it the way she wanted, and if she could even get on her bicycle and go for the ride. Retrospectively, she admits, “I don’t give myself enough credit. … If I shift my perspective and if I just shift my way of thinking – especially old thinking – then I could really get to a point where anything is possible.”

To put it simply, she says she has an “I can’t quit mentality.”

Though independent, she still aims to be a part of a larger community.

In “The Road Unpaved,” August details the bike trip she went on that followed the Pacific Coast, and how she didn’t do the trip alone. Instead, she was joined by a group of strangers on the road and had Pituitary World News help her bring awareness to her mission. “I think I still struggle with letting myself be completely immersed in community and accepting help, but it’s what I crave so deeply,” she says.

With that, August continues to battle acromegaly, loves to host parties, and aspires to bring about some positive change in the health and wellness community. She continues with her endurance training, and recently completed a tour across northern Spain, which she plans to write about in her next book.

As for the future, life might not feel like coasting downhill on a two-wheeler, but she says positively, “I live with a tumor at the base of my brain, I see things differently. So, even the challenging, crappy situations provide an opportunity to live and to be alive.”

With a smile and a twinkle in her eye, August says,“I want to stay open. I want to keep my heart open to all the possibilities that are out there for me. I want to continue to live fully in authenticity and inspire others to do the same, and there’s so much. Gosh, there’s so much. I just want to live my biggest and best life and hopefully, it inspires others to want to do the same.”

The pinnacle of what August hopes to achieve with her life comes down to her message for others: “Don’t limit yourself. Often our constraints are self-imposed, and if we have the power to put constraints on ourselves or put limits on ourselves, we have the power to undo those. We have the power to shift perspective and pivot and go in the direction of our dreams.”

Brianna Corrine is a part-time poet and full-time audiophile. She is a writer with a penchant for critiquing music and delving headfirst into various art and literary-focused spheres as she contributes regularly to a variety of publications.