Fort Walton Beach High School Head Football Coach Josh Pulliam, his wife, Allison, and their sons, Harvey and Gibson, have spent recent months coming to terms with news few families expect: Pulliam has been diagnosed with adenocarcinoma and has started treatment.

He plans to stay on the Vikings’ sideline for as long as his health allows, and he is hoping the community that has surrounded his family will keep treating him the way it always has.

Pulliam shared the news with his players and staff, and word has since spread around Fort Walton Beach. In an interview with Get The Coast, he spoke openly about his diagnosis, his family, his team and the town that has always been home, along with what he would like from the many people who have asked how they can help.

He acknowledged that talking about it does not come easily. And he wanted to share his story with the community all at once because treatment has pulled him away from his normal routine, and he felt people deserved to know why.

“Just talking about it in general…to anybody when they ask, it’s tough. I really don’t want to do it,” Pulliam said. “But I’ve been out of my normal routine here lately because of these treatments, so people need to know.”

A diagnosis at 41

Pulliam said his primary care doctor noticed elevated calcium levels a couple of summers ago. When he was tested again this past January, the levels had climbed, and additional testing over the following months led to the diagnosis. The cancer is considered an unknown primary, and doctors are still working to find its origin.

• Adenocarcinoma is a cancer that begins in the gland cells that line many of the body’s organs. When it is found without an identifiable starting point, it is known as cancer of unknown primary, according to the National Cancer Institute.

He has begun treatment, and in late October, near the end of the football season, he will begin traveling to MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston for treatment.

Pulliam said he had been pretty healthy up to that point, and the diagnosis was not something he ever expected to hear at his age.

“There’s no great way to talk about it or discuss it,” he said. “It’s a pretty serious situation, and our family understands that. It’s certainly not something you’d think you’d hear at 41-years-old.”

When he first learned what he was facing, he said, his thoughts did not go to himself. They went straight to his wife and their sons.

• “It was a complete punch in the gut. My mind went immediately to Allison and our boys,” Pulliam said. “How scared are they? What’s it going to do to them? How do we keep everything normal?”

He described the diagnosis as something the whole family is carrying. He is the one sitting in the chair during treatments, but Allison sits right beside him, and the boys are living it too. Friends check in on him, his coaches have taken on more than they need to, and people have been praying for the family, including some the Pulliams have never met.

“Our school has surrounded us. Our players are going through it with their coach. They’re seeing what adversity is firsthand,” he said. “The power of prayer is just awesome. It changes your perspective on some things.”

For now, he said, the family’s focus is on treatment, on each other and on continuing to live their lives. They plan to listen to the doctors, enjoy the good days when they come and lean on each other through the harder ones.

“We’re definitely not going to spend every day talking about it,” he said. “We’re going to laugh, live our life, and still raise two young boys. We’re still going to school and trying to get our jobs done to the best of our abilities. I’m still going to make sure I’m at every football practice I can be at and be the best head coach possible. We’re still us, and that’s what’s important.”

Telling his team

Pulliam said telling his players was one of the hardest things he has had to do, second only to talking with his boys. For years he has been the one pushing them and encouraging them, the coach who tells them everything is going to be fine and lays out what needs to be fixed. Then he found himself standing in front of them with news he did not fully understand himself.

“I’m not really much of a crier, but I definitely got teary-eyed,” he said. “Some guys didn’t really know what to say, but it was how they looked at me. That’s what I remember most. You spend years thinking your job is to take care of players, and in that moment, I realized they wanted to help take care of me.”

Those relationships, he said, grow deeper than a coach realizes while they are forming. He meets players as freshmen or sophomores, coaches them, holds them accountable, celebrates with them and watches them grow into young men, and somewhere along the way they become part of his family.

“Anybody that rides or dies with you, that’s your family for life, no matter what. That’s what I tell them,” Pulliam said. “And I definitely felt that in that room, from freshmen all the way up to seniors. It was a blessing to be able to feel that.”

A team growing up

The team Pulliam is coaching through all of this is one he is proud of. He said he has watched this group mature since he first took over the program, and the seniors have done a good job of passing the torch and doing what it takes to be successful.

“Obviously, as a coach, you want to win every game, but when you spend every afternoon with these guys, you start seeing things that don’t always show up on Friday night’s scoreboard,” he said. “Guys encouraging teammates who are struggling. You see somebody finally understand something they’ve been working on for weeks. You see these older guys taking care of the younger guys, and that’s the goal, passing the program on better than it was handed to you.”

He said he has also watched friendships form that some of his players will likely carry for the rest of their lives, and those moments are what keep him in the profession.

“That’s really why I love coaching,” Pulliam said. “We’re trying to build really good football players here, but more importantly, we’re trying to help families raise good young men, and that’s something I’ve appreciated even more lately.”

The Vikings are 2-3 overall and 1-0 in district play. Pulliam said the season has had its ups and downs, as life does, and a win in the team’s next district game would give Fort Walton Beach a 2-0 district start, something he said hasn’t been done at the school in a long time. He said the team is looking forward to the opportunity and is thankful to have it, especially at this moment.

The difference between tough and stubborn

Pulliam said there will be days during treatment when he can do everything he has always done and days when he can’t, and he is learning to be OK with that.

“I’m kind of learning that there’s a difference between being tough and being stubborn,” he said.

He said he leans on a staff of coaches he trusts and on people at the school who look out for him, including Athletic Secretary Penny Vinson, who has worked one-on-one with Pulliam in both football and weightlifting, and is now next to him at all games. At home, he credited Allison with making sure he knows when it is time to go home or when he needs to rest.

Even on the harder days, he said, coaching gives him something he needs more than ever: a normal life.

“When I’m at practice or school and I get a chance to talk about a kid’s stance, or get onto somebody if they’re late or not wearing their red, white and blue, I’m not thinking about anything else,” Pulliam said. “I’m just thinking about coaching, getting these guys right, getting them prepared for life and for Friday nights.”

Pulliam said he knew as a high school student that he wanted to be involved in football in some form and eventually become a head coach. Whether it is weightlifting in the offseason or football in the fall, he said, there is always something to coach.

Friday nights during football season are something the whole family looks forward to. Harvey has served as a ball boy for a few years alongside one of his good friends, which Pulliam said is very special to him. Allison and Gibson watch from the stands with other family members, friends and other coaches’ wives.

“People get to see that I’m doing what I love to do. I chose this profession,” he said. “As long as my health allows it, that’s where I’m going to be. That’s where I want to be. I don’t want to be anywhere else.”

Living somewhere and belonging somewhere

Pulliam graduated from crosstown rival Choctawhatchee High School in 2003 and coached there before joining Fort Walton Beach. He grew up in this town and had always heard that Fort Walton Beach High School was a special place, but he said he did not truly understand it until the past few weeks.

“I’ve learned the difference between living somewhere and belonging somewhere,” he said. “I didn’t graduate from Fort Walton, but I’m from this town. I grew up here. And somewhere along the way, this school became home. I don’t think I fully understood that until this happened.”

He said the people who have stepped forward have not treated the Pulliams like a coach and his family, but like their own family, and he credited God and the good in people for what he has seen. His sons, he said, have been watching all of it.

“Our boys see it. They see what it looks like when people show up for one another,” Pulliam said. “There aren’t many lessons I could teach them that would be more valuable than what this community is showing them right now. I sure wish we didn’t have to learn it this way, but we’ll certainly never forget it.”

The little things

Pulliam said he and his family hear and see plenty of bad news, on television and on social media, but the past few weeks have shown them that love wins out. The support hasn’t been a grand gesture. It has come as a text message, a meal, someone saying they are praying for the family, people asking about the boys, people telling Allison to call if she needs anything, and someone simply handling something at school or with the team before he ever has to think about it.

“Those things have meant everything,” he said. “Words, and even thank you, cannot describe how this has been so far.”

He said the family has been overwhelmed by the kindness and has found themselves wondering how they could ever pay it forward to the people who have gone out of their way for them.

“These people love my family, and they’re loving in the deepest way possible. That’s what this community has done for us,” Pulliam said. “No matter what happens, it’ll be remembered for the rest of our lives, and we’re so grateful and thankful.”

Messages from years ago

Some of the messages that have affected Pulliam most have come from people he had not heard from in years. Former players, former parents, cousins and other family members, coaches he once worked with, mentors, teachers and friends from different parts of his life have reached out, many of them recalling moments from the past.

“You go through life so fast…working, raising kids, coaching, paying bills, living life, trying to get through the week,” he said. “You don’t always realize the impact you’re having on somebody while it’s happening. Then 20 years later, somebody sends you a message and tells you they remember.”

He said those messages have been humbling and have led him to think a great deal about relationships and what people ultimately leave behind.

“How do you make people feel? How did we treat people? Did they know we cared about them? Were we there when they needed us?” Pulliam said. “I’ve thought about that a lot lately.”

What the family needs now

Asked what people can do, Pulliam said he hopes they will keep doing what they have been doing, pray for his family and check on Allison and the boys. 

He also asked that no one feel every conversation with him has to be about his health.

“Let’s just pick up where we left off, whether I haven’t talked to you in a long time or I just talked to you the other day,” he said. “Give me a hard time. Let’s talk about ball or whatever. Tell me about what’s going on in your life. Sometimes the greatest gift somebody can give me is just being normal.”

He said he has been flooded with phone calls and messages and has done his best to answer every one. On some days, though, he needs to rest, or he simply wants to be with his boys, and he asked that no one take a delayed reply as disrespect.

“That doesn’t mean your message wasn’t read or your prayer wasn’t appreciated,” Pulliam said. “We certainly feel all of it.”

A full house on Friday nights

Pulliam would also like to see the stands full at Steve Riggs Stadium, or wherever the Vikings are playing, with the community together and loud for players who work hard all year long.

“We want our guys to experience everything that’s special about high school football, especially in the Panhandle, especially in Okaloosa County and especially at Fort Walton Beach High School,” he said.

He said he looks at those stands differently now.

Every person sitting there, he said, has something going on in their life that no one else knows about. Someone may have lost somebody, may be worried about a child or may be dealing with their own health, and someone else may have just had the best week of their life.

“For a couple of hours on Friday night, we’re all together, and that’s community. That’s rowing as one,” Pulliam said. “That’s what I want our players to see when they look into the stands. Not just fans, but people who take time out of their Friday night to care about them.”

More than anything, he said, he wants the Viking community to be itself.

Chop wood, carry water

Before his diagnosis, Pulliam said, life was moving the way it usually does, fast, with football, school, practice, meetings, dinners and homework on repeat. Then his current circumstance happened that made him and his family stop and look around.

“When we looked around, there were people everywhere,” he said. “People standing beside Allison, people loving our boys and my family, people checking in on our parents, coaches taking things off my plate without being asked, players giving their coach a hug, people we’ve never met praying for us. That’s something that cancer can’t take from us.”

He said the experience has reminded the family how fortunate they are. They are scared at times, but they still laugh, cry, pray, go to practice and come home to each other, and they are trying hard not to spend each day worrying about what hasn’t happened yet.

His players often hear him talk about the jab as the most efficient punch in a heavyweight fight, and about chopping wood and carrying water, the unglamorous daily work that gets things done the right way.

He said those same ideas now guide his own days.

“It’s not about being some tough football coach. It’s much simpler,” Pulliam said. “Get up, love your family, do what needs to be done, be grateful for the people beside you, and do it all over again. Jab at whatever happens that day…good, bad or ugly.”

He said he doesn’t know if he, Allison and their boys will ever be able to properly explain what the support has meant to them. What they hope, he said, is that the community knows it has been felt.

“We just hope everyone knows we feel your love, we feel your prayers, we’re incredibly grateful, and we love this community right back,” he said. “And as Vikings say: Skol.”

Get The Coast will share information on community fundraisers for the Pulliam family as details are finalized. In the meantime, those who would like to support the Pulliam family can send donations through Venmo at @TeamCoachP.