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nhl great ted nolan takes lessons from the ice to surviving blood cancer
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the 3nolans in 2018: ted nolan, centre, with his sons jordan, left, and brandon.
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former nhl player and coach ted nolan has been in the memorial cup, the stanley cup playoffs and the olympics. this october, he’s honoured as an inductee into canada’s sports hall of fame, receiving the order of sport for his contributions to the nhl and for advocating for indigenous youth, using sport to inspire and build self-confidence.
while he’s faced difficult situations on the ice, he’s now turning his fierce determination on living with multiple myeloma, a chronic blood cancer that develops abnormal plasma cells in the bone marrow and impacts immunity. it causes severe bone pain, weakness, fatigue and frequent infections.
about 50 per cent of people diagnosed with multiple myeloma will survive for at least five years.
sore ribs led to cancer diagnosis
“i went for a walk and i fell,” ted, 67, says of the winter afternoon in 2022 in fredericton, new brunswick, now etched in his memory. there was hard snow on the ground. “i slipped, and you know i swear to god i fell onto a rock.” from the soreness that followed, he thought he had broken his ribs.
back home in st. davids, ontario, “in wine country” near niagara-on-the-lake, where he and his wife sandra live close to their two sons and grandkids, ted decided to go to the hospital to get his ribs checked. he was sitting in the emergency waiting room when the hockey and the medical world collided in a good way, he laughs: “thank god a doctor walked by and he said, ‘hey, coach, what are you doing?’ i said, ‘hey, doc, not too bad. i just hurt my frickin’ ribs. i’m just here to check it out.’ the doctor said, ‘well, i’ll see you shortly.’ and that’s where it all started.”
when ted got into the treatment room, the doctor suggested a cat scan and bloodwork for further investigation. after seeing the results, the doctor asked him if they could take a bone marrow biopsy right away. a biopsy is the test needed to confirm suspected cancer, although that wasn’t mentioned. “i didn’t know what bone marrow was,” he says.
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nolan ‘lucky’ his cancer was detected
by the next morning, the hockey legend was in the cancer ward. “they told me i was 95 per cent contaminated in my blood with multiple myeloma. my ribs were sore, my back was sore, and i just thought it was from a fall,” he says. “so it was a very lucky day.”
the truth is, if the cancer hadn’t been detected, he likely wouldn’t be here to share his story. over the years, he’s talked a lot about the power of believing in yourself to follow your passion—despite the odds. when he was drafted to the nhl in 1978, for example, he was “this little, skinny ojibwe kid” toughing it out with much larger players at the detroit red wings training camp. “i was so afraid because the guys were so big, fast, powerful. their legs were huge.”
now he wants to raise awareness about blood cancer and access to care, and the need for the same self-discipline in taking care of your health and going through cancer that’s required to compete in hockey.
“it was probably the most difficult thing i’ve ever dealt with in my entire life,” he admits of facing multiple myeloma. he hasn’t had it easy. he grew up with 11 siblings in garden river first nation near sault ste. marie, ontario in a house without electricity or running water. (he made himself an ice rink in the yard with one pail of water at a time.) his dad died of heart failure when ted was 14 and his mom was killed by a drunk driver when he was 24.
“this diagnosis happened to me and it swirled up all the energy that i had in the past to deal with what i’m dealing with right now,” he says, noting that if he was living in a northern community like his birthplace, “my ribs would have stayed sore and i would have put an ice pack on it and before you knew it, i probably wouldn’t be having this conversation. i think awareness is so important.”
while people know more about leukemia or being anemic, multiple myeloma isn’t as well-recognized. ted had never heard of it until his diagnosis, and then he went home with his wife and googled it (never advised, but often the go-to response). he told his wife that he only had about five months to live. in fact, life expectancy can be 10 years or more, depending on the cancer stage, a person’s age, overall health and kidney function, among other factors.
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“it really floored me,” ted says of his initial reaction. “and then you start crying and feeling really depressed and then you start chemo. the chemo isn’t the most pleasant thing in the world and then the drugs you have to take. some of these drugs would jack you up a little bit, make you feel good, and all of a sudden, it hits you like a brick. so i was on a roller coaster for four to five months.”
highs and lows of hockey taught him how to power through adversity
the highs and lows of his hockey career helped prepare him to deal with health struggles like blood cancer. physical injuries are common in the sports world. ted says that as a player, he separated his shoulder and then recovered, but then a severe lower back injury, where he ruptured three discs, put an end to his playing career when he was only 26. as for the emotional impact, he left home at 16 to play hockey in kenora, ontario and faced racism and bullying that changed his perspective.
“i went from loving the game to surviving in the game. i wanted to fight through that prejudice and i wanted to fight through that bullying, and they weren’t going to send me home.”
many years later, he started the ted nolan foundation, which has raised millions for education scholarships to help indigenous women across canada. alongside his two sons and former nhl players, brandon and jordan, he is also co-founder and president of 3nolans, an organization that provides hockey skills training for first nations youth and educational talks about living healthy, active lifestyles and becoming positive role models in their community.
“i try to pass this on to the kids that there’s going to be some tough things that happen to you in life. and one of the easiest things people do sometimes is to quit,” he explains, adding that he doesn’t want to see anyone quit and give up on themselves. he wants to promote self-confidence and the power of mindset to move you forward in sport and life, especially when there’s adversity.
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power of mindset to succeed
“you’ve got to set your mind in order to get through,” he says of treatment for multiple myeloma. “i had no control of my physical being. that was the work of wonderful, wonderful doctors that i had. to tell you the truth, the physical stuff was difficult, but i never viewed the physical stuff as all that hard compared to the psychological battle.”
after the high-dose chemotherapy to eliminate cancerous cells, ted underwent a stem cell transplant to restore the bone marrow’s ability to produce healthy blood cells. common for people going through cancer and stem cell transplant, the different drugs can make you sick, extremely tired and experience brain fog that muddies your thoughts and quality of life.
as ted found with his low immunity from the transplant and increasing brain fog, “it takes away your concentration and you just get lost. i think i spent almost half a year inside my house. i just walked in the basement.” he stayed inside, like a “lost soul,” fearful of catching even the slightest cold because it could be lethal in his condition.
now his cancer is in remission, his memoir “life in two worlds: a coach’s journey from the reserve to the nhl and back” was published in 2023, and he’s enjoying his family and his work with youth and cancer awareness. he walks every day and watches his diet, which is something he’s always done. “one of the things i learned through sport is nutrition and exercise, and what have you, makes a difference, so i’ve been doing that ever since i was a little boy. it has paid off.”
‘i pray every day’
his blood cancer could come back, but it’s key to put those thoughts in a compartment in your mind and try not to dwell on it, he says.
“i’m not going to lie, i pray every day. today i’m good. so it’s one of those things that every time i go for blood work, i pray i don’t get a call from the doctor and i don’t, so i’m assuming it’s good.”
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his cancer experience has drawn on his strength and skillset that made him an award-winning hockey coach, and it’s also reinforced his early life lessons. now he has even more insight and hope to give young people, and those with a cancer diagnosis, to get through tough times.
“things happen and no one’s perfect, but to understand one another and to care about one another is probably the most important thing in life. and that’s the way i coached.”
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