Stephen Pecevich promised his baby battling brain cancer that he would be her legs to walk, her eyes to see and her hands to eat. All he wanted was a chance to be a father to her father ... "My angel on earth fights on"

Stephen Pecevich, Boston.com Correspondent...in his own words:

I was not a marathon runner before my daughter Sydni, who at only two months old began a lifelong crossing as a result of a ruthless battle with brain cancer. I became a marathon runner because of her.

You see, one day in March 2005, just a few short months after her first 12-hour brain surgery, Sydni’s chances for survival looked, at best, bleak, as they would many times thereafter. She wasn’t expected to survive the night.

The promise and why I run: while cradling my child in my arms in Room 906 at Children’s Hospital Boston that evening, I whispered into her ear, promising my daughter that if she would just give me an opportunity to be a father, to be a loving Dad to her, I vowed before God to love her, no matter where the fates may take us. If need be, I would be her legs to walk, her eyes to see and her hands to eat. All I wanted was a chance to be a father to her.

Sydni kept fighting. And I began running in her honor, to keep my promise.

God willing, this year’s Boston Marathon will be my 16th marathon in the past eight years, which I will have labored through in my daughter’s honor. Since 2005, I’ve agonized through (but completed) marathons in New York, Chicago, Minnesota, Nashville, Toronto and Hartford, among others. My aim this year is to raise $8,000 for the Joe Andruzzi Foundation, in order to help families like my own. Families unwittingly chosen from above, now involuntarily venturing down the same heartbreaking, unforgiving and, at times, demoralizing road less traveled.

Sydni will never walk, talk or eat, other than through her feeding tube. She expresses herself through her eyes, laughter, smiles and moans. Terrifying episodes alight without warning. Just five weeks ago, for example, she went from laughing and smiling in one moment to enduring a brutal Grand Mal seizure, pneumonia, the flu and emergency brain surgery – all within six days.

And then, four weeks later (just last week), she was back under the knife, suffering through more unforeseen brain surgery relating to a malfunctioning shunt. Her health is beyond the definition of unpredictable. I’ve been given so many discouraging diagnoses over the years that I don’t even ask anymore. Still, my angel on earth fights on.

Sydni truly is an angel, who has taught me great strength in weakness and unthinkable joy in heartache. She inspires my running, and my faith and love for her – as well as for my 10-year-old daughter Tari and 6-year-old son Tristin – gives me courage as I journey down these frightful “roads less traveled.”