Walking In Memory of Dee Gonser... a cherished C-brat

S

Susan E

New member
Hello C-brats friends and family.

Don Gonser, Tom Elliott and I are walking again this year to raise money for the ASL Association to find a cause and cure for Lou Gehrigs disease. We are walking Saturday, Sept 21 in Vancouver, wa.

We are walking this year to honor Dee Gonser, Don’s wife, who passed this January of Lou Gehrigs disease.

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There is so much to say about why we are doing this. ALS is a horrific disease. Also known as Lou Gehrig's Disease, it is a progressive, neuromuscular disease where nerve cells of the central nervous system stop working and die off. That slowly robs the body of its ability to walk, speak, swallow and breathe. Every 90 minutes a person in this country is diagnosed with ALS. People with ALS only live 2-5 years past diagnosis. Patients have to cope with being progressively paralyzed to the point that they can’t move or breathe and die. There is no cure or a known cause.

Dee and my Aunt Sheila both recently died this way.

I have donated many a times to breast cancer events but never really saw the benefit. With the ASL association I personally have seen the way this organization directly helped my Aunt Sheila and Dee and Don. They loaned my Aunt Sheila and Dee high-end power wheel chairs, and Dee with an additional 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 and advice on how to modify the house for what they would have to cope with. The ALS association provides counseling for families and organizes support groups. Dee and Don received this help from the ALS association. Don continues to meet with and help local families that are dealing with this disease through the ALS association. The ALS Association states that care for ALS patients can cost 200,000 per year, depleting families of their savings.

Dee worked hard to bring about awareness of this disease. 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 click on proclamation: ALS awareness month.
Dee was already wheel chair bound by this time

Please donate and helps us find a cause.

online is the easiest. Dee Gonser, Team : Dee’s Wing Walkers

The link is below

Susan Elliott, Dee'sWingwalkers

or

donate to Don Gonser
Don Gonser, Dee's WingWalkers

or send 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. my address is at the bottom.

Printable deposit slips

Thanks for reading. I will post more about the great work the ALS association is doing to find a cure. The walk is in just a few short weeks. Dee's team raised the most money last year, and we would like to do more.
here is a photo of last years walk

wing_walkers.sized.jpg

Susan Tom Dee and Don

Susan and Tom Elliott
724 118th street ne
Marysville, wa 98271
 
John Thankyou So MUCH for donating. It will be a nice reunion for me personally to see Dee's extended family. They are just as caring as fun and she was.

thanks again

susan
 
As a nurse, I have been exposed to this terrible disease and the horrible destruction it causes the person and their loved ones. I have been present when the ALS association comes to a care facility a person is in and educates them and the family on the disease and offers emotional support. They also hold a meeting with the care staff to educate them, answer questions and leave a phone number for anyone to use should situations or questions arise as the disease progresses. The are very hands-on. Well worth supporting this cause.
Todd
 
Susan -

We have such fond memories of times shared with Dee and Don -- thanks so much for posting to the Brat site -- we have given a donation in memory of Dee. We are so happy the wing-walkers are walking to help others cope (and research to help find the cause). Dee's smile will always brighten our lives -- she lives within all who knew her.
 
Bill and EL

Thankyou for donating to Dee's team. We will be thinking of you and all our C-Dory family that have shared life with us as we walk in Dee's honor.

susan
 
Here is a New ALSRP Video on the new research for two new drugs that need to get into clinical trails, and ultimately get FDA approval if found effective for ALS. See the link below. But we need money to get this critical research done. currently there is only one drug that helps with limited success. we need this program to be funded. Another researcher has developed "ALS in a test tube" to be used for screening molecules for ALS therapies. I participated in screens for natural pesticides. we screened thousands of molecule a year cheaply. I am particular excited to hear of a successful screening platform.


please remember that Tom, Don and I walk in Dee's memory in 10days. we raised 10K last year and want to reach that again. so far we are almost half way there at about 5K



We wanted to share with you this video that features The ALS Association's Chief Scientist, Dr. Lucie Bruijn, speaking about the ALS Research Program (ALSRP) at the Department of Defense and the vital role it is playing in the search for a treatment for ALS. In the video, Dr. Bruijn highlights several potential treatments that have been made possible by ALSRP funding.

The continued success of the ALSRP is the direct result of the efforts of people with ALS and other ALS advocates to share their stories with Members of Congress and urge them to continue funding for the program. In July, the House of Representatives voted to provide $7.5 million for the ALSRP next year, which, if enacted, would bring total funding for the program to nearly $50 million.

Thank you to all ALS Advocates. You are making a difference!

Watch the video:
http://web.alsa.org/site/R?i=1uEcUwrgFo9VAmiP5vITMg
 
here is a link to just one example of how your donation help ALS research


The ALS Association Awards $500,000 to the NEALS Consortium for Its TREAT ALS Clinical Trials Network

For the sixth consecutive year, The ALS Association is pleased to announce its support of the Northeast ALS Consortium (NEALS), the largest consortium of ALS clinical researchers in the world. This year's award totals $500,000 and will fund new initiatives and ongoing programs that will increase the quality and efficiency of clinical trials for ALS.

The grant will support the work of NEALS in its collaboration with The Association's Translational Research Advancing Therapy (TREAT) ALS program, a diverse portfolio of ALS research to find treatments and a cure for ALS.

Click the link below to read the full article:
http://web.alsa.org/site/R?i=YalHJuIBKWb1mt-6ZtDptw


thanks
susan Elliott
 
Hi, this is a re-post of what I wrote last year. many of you have seen in before so I apologize in advance for that. I just can't say it any better then I already have. I still have a hard time talking about Shelia, which she would chastise me for. This event for me is about helping the people who have ALS now. Its about quality of care and life style until they pass. Research is fine for the future but I am more concern for the present and that's why I walk.

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 independence 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.
Click to expand...
 
I never had the pleasure of meeting Dee, but reading this (and previous) threads I can see that if I had, it would have made my life just that much sunnier (her smile looks like the sun coming out). One thing that comes through in this (and previous) threads is what amazing people Dee had in her life in the form of family and friends (C-Brats fitting in both categories). What a treasure. Susan, I can tell you are the best kind of friend.

I had been reading along - and of course thinking I would donate - but (and I don't know if this is just me)... I just hadn't quite gotten around to it yet. But your recent posts are just so compelling. I mean, you didn't just ask for donations, but you put time and effort into telling and showing us details about exactly how the money is being used. Complete with links to even more information. Both you and the ALS organization(s) (and Dee's Wing Walkers) obviously rock. After all that, how could I just be "too lazy" to click and donate?

Sunbeam

Edited to add: Donation made. I won't be in Washington at the time of the walk, so I "sponsored" Susan Elliot on the Dee's Wing Walkers team.
 
Sunbeam .. what a gracious post, I am so humbled. I do wish you could have meet Dee. Don her husband is just as wonderful. And I course My husband Tom it a dream come true. I would be crushed to lose him.

Thankyou for your donation. I hope and pray a reason/ cause is found for this disease soon. A former co worker has pick up the cause as someone in their high school drill team has been diagnosed

thank you

susan
 
to all our C-brat friends..

I wanted to give a shout out to Amy Frazey another great C-Brat. Amy is another one of those amazing, wonderfull people I have had the great pleasure of knowing through the C-brats. She is kind and fun and a very caring individual. She was and still is a good friend to Dee. Amy and John are a integral part of our team, Dee's wingwalkers. They walked last year and again this year. I am so lucky to get to spend time with them during the summers boating and the ALS walk.

My shout out to Her is that Amy has raised 1095$ this year for ALS on our team. WOW. Great job Amy. That is a lot of Footwork. It say a lot about how motivated she is and how lots of people support her because she is to great.

We walk this weekend in Dee's memory. so if you where thinking about donating now is the time. any small amount helps.

Thankyou so much for reading this last post of the year


Susan Elliott


The Southwest Washington Walk is right around the corner. Together the southwest chapter has to raise the remaining
$2,918.89 before we reach our $64,000.00 goal.
In fact, if each of our Walkers raises $100 in the next 7 days, we'll
have a lot to celebrate on Saturday | September 21, 2013.
 
In the age of computers life is supposed to be more convenient. ...how ever life is still damn messy.


I have just been informed that not all of you who donated to our team have received the personal emails I have written to you of my sincere thanks. I am so sorry if that is the case. A few who posted publically I thanked here on the cbrats site. I regret that others I sent thank yous through the ALS donation page and some of those went into people's junk mail instead of their inbox. I will make sure I rectify that.

Larry and Nancy Howorth made donation and so did Peter and Karyn of cdancer and I don't believe they received our thankyous.

I am now very Very concerned that there are a few people last year who also did not get my personal emails of thanks because it went to junk mail..



So I will try contact those people also. Sometimes good old fashion snail mail is best


I want you All to know how wonderful it is to us that you donated to Dee's team. It really helps us personally. We still miss Dee. We remember the suffering she went through and it helps us to heal by raising money that we know will go the the families who are now going through the same thing.


thankyou SoMuch to all.


susan elliott



Forgive the misspellings as I type this from my phone
 
Susan -

We appreciate your concern about thanking donors, and we appreciate your thanks -- but we believe that knowing Dee and sharing her smile is more than enough thanks for us.

But, let us thank you and the others for supporting the MS walk and letting us all know how we can also help others with MS, in Dee's memory.
 
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