Heart Broken
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cf foundation
I just looked at my schedule yesterday and just discovered I will not be able to do the Great Strides walk this year. We have a 4 day class to prepare us for the certification exams upon graduation. I will be in class when the local Great Strides walk is going on. The kicker is that the class is at the same school the walk is being held. Thats ok though. It's not gonna stop my fundraising and efforts to reach the goal I have set. That is the most important thing anyway, getting money to the CF Foundation for research.
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January 24, 2009 at 4:30 PM
Hey Marcus...
I'm sorry for the heartbreak -- but I'm thankful for who you are and that you want to do Great Strides...
I have cystic fibrosis... I was diagnosed on my birthday back in 1973... In 1973, life expectency for a CF patient was 14 -- I was 13... Can't imagine how my Mom felt about that... Marcus, I'll be 50 in a year and a half!
Over the years I've had so many RTs and PTs in my life -- and a big part of the reason I'm still alive is because of them... They cared for me -- they taught me how to more effectively care for myself... They made my life better.
Almost nine years ago, a beautiful girl named Kari saved my life when she became my donor -- I have both of her precious lungs... I learned of her two years after my transplant and I think of her throughout the day, every day... I can see her smile when I close my eyes. An RT helped me through much of that too!
Tomorrow, I'm taking her beautiful lungs 80 floors up the stairwells to the top of the Aon Center in Chicago for Children's Memorial Hospital in the "Step up for Kids"... It's special because I was diagnosed at Children's... At the end of February I have a team named "Kari's Klimbers" climbing 94 floors up the Hancock Building in the Hustle Up the Hancock... My team also has a half dozen of Kari's precious friends -- they're my friends now.
I can do this because of people like you -- and I won't forget that.
I have a website dedicated to Kari and our climbs at www.ClimbingForKari.org
I blog about organ donation at www.ReviveHope.com
I hope you do well as an RT student... One of the most special things to me now is to remind people like you that what you do is important -- and that there are people like me out in the world who truly value the treatment we've received over the years...
And Marcus -- after living 39 years with crappy, CF lungs, with people like you trying to help me squeeze a little more air through them -- this breathin' stuff with "real" lungs freakin' blows my mind every single day...
You take care -- keep helping us fight the good fight...
Love,
Steve
Steve Ferkau
Chicago, IL
January 24, 2009 at 5:08 PM
The previous post almost brought me to tears.
You're such a great person, Marcus! Keep doing what you're doing...
January 24, 2009 at 6:53 PM
Happy you are still raisin' money though.. whoo hoo!!
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