Trickett Died Last Night

Trickett Fewell Wendler died last night. She died from ALS. Trickett was a young mother with three children and a loving husband. She leaves behind mourning parents and friends. I read an article recently where the author referred to ALS as a disease which primarily attacks older white males. Would someone please tell that to Trickett's children?

Trickett died from the ever increasing weakness associated with ALS. It took her ability to walk, to feed herself, to talk, to hold herself upright, to breathe. This is a vicious, slow moving beast which Trickett saw from beginning to end, her mind and spirit bright and alert right to her last breath. Now her husband cries for her and her children wonder why nothing could help her.

Yesterday I spent the day with friends and Katherine, exploring downtown Austin, Texas. We visited the capitol building and then wandered down the city streets to the South by Southwest festival. Rob, Terry, and Katherine took turns pushing my wheelchair, with me on board, around the capitol grounds and through the main floor of the capitol building. They pushed my wheelchair from there to the festival venues. They pushed me through the crowds, into the bars and restaurants, and back up the hill to where we were parked.

You see, I am resigned to being pushed a lot these days. ALS has weakened my arms just enough that the exhaustion of pushing myself around for the day sets in far too early, is far to powerful for me to resist, for me to deny that I need help. I can still move myself around pretty good; I can push my own wheelchair in most situations, except up steep ramps and slopes. It's just that I am approaching that weakness threshhold where I won't be able to any more.

I am fairly sure I can last out this trip. I wonder if it will be my last one. Of course, I wonder that with every trip I take. It's not that I won't travel. It's just that my travel will have to change, if it continues at all. Like Trickett, I can see tomorrow coming. I know what is happening. I can feel the changes in my body. That's just what happens with ALS; the train is coming and one day it will hit me full on, at low speed, crushing my life with weakness.