J
jomoco
Guest
Life has a way of humbling you regardless of how good you may think you are.
I consider myself a modestly talented strategic tree removal expert, apparently good enough to raise 3 children with my wife's unstinting help from cradle to college. All my children are now grownup and working, doing their thing.
But a rather challenging new aspect of life presented itself to me when my wife began having trouble accomplishing finely detailed crafts like sewing or other highly co-ordinated tasks involved with being a full time mother to 3 children. At first the problem was barely perceptable when she would drop or fumble things, but it slowly got worse in small increments until I knew in my gut that things weren't right, and that she was suffering from the same neurodegenerative disease that had killed her mother, Huntingtons Chorea, an invariably fatal disease, the same that killed folk music legend Woodie Guthrie of "This land was made for you and me" fame.
It's very fortunate for me and my kids that this wicked disease is a very slow killer, because this allowed the kids to reach adulthood before their mom became an invalid that requires weekly nurse visits and constant supervision except when sleeping.
So rather than burden any of my children with the unenviable chores of invalid care, I took them on myself by going into semi-retirement as a fulltime arborist, becoming the primary caregiver to my wife as she goes through the hospice portion of this incurable disease.
I spend the majority of my time now on the computer trying to stay abreast of the latest stemcell clinical trials targeted for neurodegenerative disease patients going on currently around the world, particularly in Germany at the moment.
I've found the most important thing for a patient's general well being is keeping a sense of hope alive and kickin as long as humanly possible.
And while my wife can no longer communicate with me very well, her mind is still intact and working relatively well, including her sense of humor!
So I communicate with her daily in a chatty sort of way by joshing her that if the stemcell trial in Germany is successful I'm going to put her and her crazy corgi on the next flight to Germany whether she's scared to death of flying in planes or not!
This new insight into the lives of literally hundreds of thousands of other families dealing with debilitating and fatal neurodegenerative diseases like ALS, Parkinsons and Alzheimers is without a doubt the toughest aspect of life's challenges I've experienced so far.
But the words for better or worse, in sickness and in health, are not just meaningless mouthings to me.
I firmly believe that the true measure of a man is not how well he deals with success, but rather how well he deals with serious life threatening adversity when it gets up right in your face.
So now you guys know why I have so much time on my hands to keep my arboreal career alive raising hell in various tree forums when I'm not researching the latest stemcell trials that are the only real hope for curing people like my wife Mary.
Life throws curveballs sometimes, and sometimes even getting a base hit is nearly impossible, but if you keepswinging and keep your eye on the ball, atleast you've been true to yourself and your word before god.
jomoco
I consider myself a modestly talented strategic tree removal expert, apparently good enough to raise 3 children with my wife's unstinting help from cradle to college. All my children are now grownup and working, doing their thing.
But a rather challenging new aspect of life presented itself to me when my wife began having trouble accomplishing finely detailed crafts like sewing or other highly co-ordinated tasks involved with being a full time mother to 3 children. At first the problem was barely perceptable when she would drop or fumble things, but it slowly got worse in small increments until I knew in my gut that things weren't right, and that she was suffering from the same neurodegenerative disease that had killed her mother, Huntingtons Chorea, an invariably fatal disease, the same that killed folk music legend Woodie Guthrie of "This land was made for you and me" fame.
It's very fortunate for me and my kids that this wicked disease is a very slow killer, because this allowed the kids to reach adulthood before their mom became an invalid that requires weekly nurse visits and constant supervision except when sleeping.
So rather than burden any of my children with the unenviable chores of invalid care, I took them on myself by going into semi-retirement as a fulltime arborist, becoming the primary caregiver to my wife as she goes through the hospice portion of this incurable disease.
I spend the majority of my time now on the computer trying to stay abreast of the latest stemcell clinical trials targeted for neurodegenerative disease patients going on currently around the world, particularly in Germany at the moment.
I've found the most important thing for a patient's general well being is keeping a sense of hope alive and kickin as long as humanly possible.
And while my wife can no longer communicate with me very well, her mind is still intact and working relatively well, including her sense of humor!
So I communicate with her daily in a chatty sort of way by joshing her that if the stemcell trial in Germany is successful I'm going to put her and her crazy corgi on the next flight to Germany whether she's scared to death of flying in planes or not!
This new insight into the lives of literally hundreds of thousands of other families dealing with debilitating and fatal neurodegenerative diseases like ALS, Parkinsons and Alzheimers is without a doubt the toughest aspect of life's challenges I've experienced so far.
But the words for better or worse, in sickness and in health, are not just meaningless mouthings to me.
I firmly believe that the true measure of a man is not how well he deals with success, but rather how well he deals with serious life threatening adversity when it gets up right in your face.
So now you guys know why I have so much time on my hands to keep my arboreal career alive raising hell in various tree forums when I'm not researching the latest stemcell trials that are the only real hope for curing people like my wife Mary.
Life throws curveballs sometimes, and sometimes even getting a base hit is nearly impossible, but if you keepswinging and keep your eye on the ball, atleast you've been true to yourself and your word before god.
jomoco
