Knotty C and Susan E Walk to defeat ALS fundraiser

S

Susan E

New member
To all C-brat Friends,

Dee and Don Gonser of Knotty-C and myself, Susan Elliott and Tom Elliott (of the Susan E) are raising money for ALS association to find a cure for Lou Gehrig’s disease, which is degenerative and fatal. This year we will be walking in the ALS association’s “Walk to defeat ALS”, in Vancouver Washington, Esther Short Park, on September 22 2012.

Our team is Dee’s Wing Walkers. Please take a look at Dee’s web page.

Dee's Wing Walkers

Donate on line to Dee in her “Walk to Defeat ALS “ here

Donate online

AS some of you know Dee was diagnosed with Lou Gerhig’s disease just after the Seattle boat show in February. This year has forced many changes and adjustments to their lives. Dee is now in a wheel chair. Dee continued to teach until April and work for the City of Vancouver until June. Don teaches full time at Clark University in addition to Dee’s full time caregiver. They are both working very hard as each day presents new challenges. Don has made many modifications to their home to accommodate their new way of life. Don purchased a yellow bus with a wheel chair lift, and retrofitted it for Dee’s wheel chair so they can get around town and to C-Dory events. He is also trouble shooting a lift for the boat so Dee and Don can take afternoon rides in the boat.

The Washington chapter of the ASL Association has helped them along the way. The ALS association is an amazing organization that helps families with the disease, directly. I have walked the last two years for “Defeat ALS” as my Aunt Sheila passed away of Lou Gehrig’s this January 2012. They loaned my Aunt Sheila and Dee high-end power wheel chairs, and Dee with an additional a patient lift while they waited for doctors and insurance to catch up with their needs. These chairs are essential for dealing with the disease, both physically and emotionally. These chairs are their only source of mobility. Two weeks after Dee was diagnosed the executive director of the ALS association visited Dee and Don in their home to provide assistance as they started on this journey. The ALS association provides counseling for families and organizes support groups. Dee and Don are receiving this help from ALS association now. The ALS Association states that care for ALS patients can cost 200,000 per year, depleting families of their savings.

Dee has already spoken in community about ALS. She gave a speech at the City of Vancouver where the Mayor gave a proclamation that the month of May was ALS awareness month. Here is the link to see Dee talk about ALS and the association

Dee's speech

We ask that you donate to our team, any small amount that you can. We have set a goal of 15,000 this year. When Don and Dee do something they do it BIG. They go all out. Their multiple trips in the Knotty C to Alaska and the yellow bus says it all. We would love your support. You can donate on the Dee’s Wing Walkers ALS web site directly or send a check to one of us and we will send it in. Join our team and walk with us on Sept 22, in Vancouver, and you will see just how many people’s live have been changed by ALS in our community. Have a garage sale or a bake sale at work in honor of Dee and her Wing Walkers. Forgo one Starbuck’s coffee and donate it to our team instead, it all adds up. Not only are we raising money for a cure but your donations directly help people with this disease today.

Send a donation in Dee Gonser’s name to
The ALS Association • 700 Multnomah St. Suite #870 • Portland, OR 97232

You can print a deposit slip from this link or I can send one in the mail to you. Or send me your check to the ALS Association and I will do the rest.

Or donate online as it is the easiest. Dee Gonser, Team : Dee’s Wing Walkers

Donate online
or
Printable deposit slips

Thanks for reading

Susan Tom Dee and Don

Susan and Tom Elliott
724 118th street ne
Marysville, wa 98271



[/img]
 
Thanks Susan, tough situation for all. Donation sent. Dee and Don and family and friends added to my prayers for peace and comfort. Best. George and Carolyn
 
Thankyou so much for the wonderfull donations,

We Have raised $655. we are on our way to 15K by Sept 22 when we walk with Dee and Don in Vancouver. we would love to have any of you join us.


Here is a little trivia of Lou Gehrig's disease

ALS was first described in 1869 by French neurologist Jean-Martin Charcot, but it wasn't until 1939 that Lou Gehrig brought national and international attention to the disease when he abruptly retired from baseball after being diagnosed with ALS. Most commonly, the disease strikes people between the ages of 40 and 70, and as many as 30,000 Americans have the disease at any given time. ALS has cut short the lives of other such notable and courageous individuals as Hall of Fame pitcher Jim "Catfish" Hunter, Senator Jacob Javits, actors Michael Zaslow and David Niven, creator of Sesame Street Jon Stone, television producer Scott Brazil, boxing champion Ezzard Charles, NBA Hall of Fame basketball player George Yardley, pro football player Glenn Montgomery, golfer Jeff Julian, golf caddie Bruce Edwards, British soccer player Jimmy Johnstone, musician Lead Belly (Huddie Ledbetter), photographer Eddie Adams, entertainer Dennis Day, jazz musician Charles Mingus, composer Dimitri Shostakovich, former vice president of the United States Henry A. Wallace and U.S. Army General Maxwell Taylor.
 
For those of you that know the area where the walk will occur, is there a marina with in walking distance? can we make a gathering out of this event?
 
Well-written Susan. I'm currently out of town but I'll be sending in my donation shortly. A great cause that i'm more than happy to support.

Peter & Caryn
C-Dancer
 
A big thanks to all. The donations are coming in! We appreciate your support so much. Dee would thank you herself but typing is difficult for her these days so I will help her with that in another post.

Yes there is a public dock about a quarter of a mile away. It's actually on the way of the walk. Could accommodate 15 or so C-Dory size boats if no one else is docked. It's at the Quay just below the I-5 bridge. No power/water.

Thank you again,

Don
 
Seem to recall a post where someone solved the boat access issue ... Will let you know if we find any helpful suggestions. Donation sent and Alaska Airlines is happy to match 100%.
 
Amy and Paul,

Thankyou SO much for donating to our team.

That is SO fantastic that alaska airlines will match your donation. When I was working for Amgen in Seattle they would do that too. so message to all. you can ask your employers to match your gift.


we have had a number of C-brats donate and we have raised over a 1000$ and were are the #2 team in donations. It will be a great day to walk with all our freinds and helpers in sept.

thanks again.

susan and tom , Dee and Don
 
TO find a CURE

here is a video (albeit 2009) on the possibility of using skin cells, turn then into stem cells and then use them to replace nerve cell with potential to help ALS patients.

Research takes smart people with novel ideas and then money to test those ideas. SO i am not the smart one but i can walk and raise money

ALS stem cell research[/url]
 
Dee and I have 1 month before we participate in our fundraiser,Walk to Defeat ALS. in vancouver sept 22.

we have had amazing support from our Cdory family. we have raise over 3000 dollars. we are the second best team at raising money for a cure. I would love to see Dee and Don reaction if we could be the team that raised the most money. We are only behind the highest team by 500 dollars.

Dee is doing well, and breathing with a V-pap machine to keep her energy up. Don has to put some more work into the yellow bus to keep then mobile with the wheel chairlift. But september is coming soon.

If you have not donated yet please consider our cause. every day 16 people are diagnosed with ALS. the next day 16 more. and so on and so on until we find a cause and cure for ALS.

thanks for you time

susan elliott
 
Hi,
I have not weighted in here yet and have a hard time doing so now. For those of you that don’t know my aunt Shelia died in January of ALS. This was just a few months before Dee was told she had the same. My family has walked and raised for ALS for the last three years. Before that it was just another three letter acronym (TLA) that you hear about all the time. Just another one of those TLA’s that someone or their kid is raising money for yet again. You smile and say yes and buy the cookies or whatever they are selling and wonder just how much of that money really goes to help people. Yes I am a very cynical kind of person. I also wonder if there will even be a cure. Money can’t fix everything and I knew that it was not going to come in time for my aunt if it came at all.

Let me tell you about my aunt first. Shelia was the oldest of five girls, first to go to college, First women investigator for the state of California. At just 5’ 2” she was a force to reckon with. She was a very independent person that lived alone and liked it that way. She was happy in her own skin and not dependent on others for her own happiness, a personnel trait that I not only share but admire very much. She was only married once and never had children but was a great aunt. When my son James and I moved back to CA after I left the Marine Corps she took to James as if he was her own. She lived nearby, 80 mile, and would take James so I could get a break every once in a while. I felt that she treated him more than just a nephew and more like a grandchild. Her passing was a great loss to many of us but also to the world as a whole.

I tell you all this not for emotion but to give you a base line of a life that was robbed of all the best parts of her. ALS does not affect the mind but only the body. It attacks the system and slowly robs the human spirit of the ability to act upon its desires and needs. You lose the ability to walk. To get up and down yourself. You need help to get in and out of bed, the rest room, the dinner table, the car. It just robs you of the ability to enjoy your life and makes you dependent on others. After that is general takes your ability to move your hands and arms. You can no longer feed yourself, write, and hold a book, type, or hold a phone. This is more than making you dependent; it slowly cuts off your ability to communicate with the world or even your closest loved ones unless they come see you. After that it’s the ability to eat and or talk that finally steals your independency and communications with even the closest to you. But ALS leaves you with the full use of your mental abilities so you can think about it and your life.

Again I did not tell you this for emotions but for you to understand why I so willingly support the ALS Association. I found that the worth of the ALS Ass. Is not in finding a cure to help my aunt but in the way that they helped my family and Sheila and how they are now helping Dee and Don. In both cases they helped family with dealing with the insurance companies, not that the insurance companies were evil ,but that ALS knew what to ask for and how and from who. Who to get the right approvals for ramps, hand rails, wheel chairs and all sorts of other things that my family would not have know where available. Things that were going to take time to get, like high end wheel chairs and hospital beds, where lent to us until we could get the right chairs. Items like iPads with programs and a large t shaped tools to type with. This alone allowed Shelia to extend not only her ability to communicate but her influence on all of us. It greatly extended her quality of life much further then it would have been 10 years ago. Its all the little things that the ALS did for my mom and her sisters that I want to bring your attention to. It’s these things that make me walk every year. That makes me ask you to support the ALS and their mission. Is a really hard thing in life when a TLA becomes a fact of life for you and your love ones. I hope that you all understand that it has taken me 8 months to be able to write this letter. Thank you.
 
Very well stated and thoughtfully written. Thanks for expressing your feelings on the subject....... Tom?!?!?

Was this really written by Tom and not Susan???

Just kidding Tom. Just not used to seeing the darn jarhead be so eloquent that's all! Must be the other side of you that gave Susan a reason to marry you in the first place.

Seriously Tom, thank you for sharing your sincere feeling with all of us.

Hopefully, the research done by the ALS Association will indeed result in a cure in the near future. As Mark said, God bless Dee and Don in their battle with ALS.



Take care,
Dan, Tanya, and Hannah on C-Renity
 
Thank you Tom , your aunt must have been a truly great person and made a big impact. I get that it took 8 months to write about Sheila. She's proud of you my friend. George :thup
 
Dee, since this monumental event is soon to transpire (9/22) I am bringing this thread back up as a reminder to all and to re-iterate that we are thinking of you.
 
Back
Top