A Short Life That Touched So Many - Peyton Moore

This morning I awoke like any other morning. Early. Weekdays and Saturdays I'm usually up at 4:30AM. I have early morning clients to train at the studio during the week and on Saturdays, I have to get the water coolers out on the greenway before my runners have their Saturday morning long run. Sundays, however, I can sleep in. But my body has an internal clock now of 4:30AM. So now, even though no alarm is set, I often find myself awake at 4:30am on a Sunday. Today was no different. I laid there a while and tried to go back to sleep. Didn't work. Turned on the TV and watched Cindy Crawford try to convince me I'd look years younger if I rubbed this rare melon all over my face. I finally got up and decided to catch-up on reading some of my favorite running blogs.

The long hours needed to keep RunnerDude's Fitness growing has taken it's toll on my own blog writing, much less having the time to read other blogs. But today, this morning, I had that time. 

I headed to my blogging buddy, Noah Moore's blog, Moore on Running. Noah is an amazing guy and I've been following his blog pretty much since I started mine back in 2008-2009. Noah has a great story. He overcame obesity and did a 360 in health and fitness and not only for himself, but his entire family. Noah is one of the very first "How Running Changed My Life" stories I featured on the blog. Click here to read that post.

So, this morning I was struck numb when I saw his most recent  post "Our Miracle, Our Love, Our Angel-

Peyton." The post began..." Many of you who follow my blog know about the passing of my son, Peyton Moore (June 4, 2013)." It had only been a few months since I last read Noah's blog. This couldn't be. 

In December, Peyton experienced a seizure and was shortly after diagnosed with benign rolandic epilepsy. Often diagnosed in kids ages 6-8, benign rolandic epilepsy often shows itself as mild, infrequent seizures. Most cases cease when the child reaches his/her teen years. Peyton had several more mild seizures after that one, but the last known seizure was in February. On June 3rd, after not getting up as usual for school, Peyton's dad found him still in bed not breathing. He died the following day at the hospital.

Although just 9-years-old, Peyton was responsible for saving two people's lives--his mom and dad. Peyton was the inspiration for Noah's dramatic weight loss as well as Jennifer's quitting smoking. Peyton also inspired many others. Peyton was often right by his dad's side while coaching many new runners in Noah's Couch to 5K program.

My heart goes out to Noah, Jennifer and the entire Moore family as well as the Charleston running community. Even though I never met Peyton in person, I feel like a virtual part of the family having watched him grow into such an awesome young man through his dad's blog.