Walk to D'Feet ALS

Hey everyone - Serious topic today. Mommy is sad and I wanted to know why. She said she was missing her dad. She told me that Grandpa Dennis had this really bad disease called ALS. He lived with it for 4 years. She said he lost his battle with the disease before she and Daddy got married so definitely before I was born. It makes her sad that Grandpa had to miss out on meeting me. She said he would have LOVED me to pieces and she can just imagine how much fun he would have had playing with me and having me sit on his lap. She loved to sit on his lap so she is sure I would have too. I wanted to know what caused Grandpa to get this disease. She said no one knows what causes it and there is no way to cure it. She said sometimes people get diseases from not eating right or other unhealthy habits. It didn't make a difference that Grandpa didn't smoke and it didn't help that he walked a lot for exercise. He liked unhealthy foods, but that didn't do it either (she said he had an operation that fixed the effects of that). What really impressed me was how she said he was so brave. You all know how much I like to move. Well Grandpa overtime lost more and more of his ability to move. That would really stink! He got around by driving a wheel chair. I think it is fun to be pushed in the wheelchair at church, but I wouldn't want to be in it all day. I guess Grandpa Dennis was really strong and didn't feel sorry for himself. I sure wish I could have met him.

Mommy has been thinking about Grandpa Dennis because the annual ALS walk is October 10. Her and Daddy are going to a wedding in Chicago so Mommy is a virtual walker. Grandma and I are going to walk in memory of Grandpa. The walk raises money to help people living with ALS (PALS). PALS need a lot of extra things to get by day by day - different chairs, things to hold onto, things to move them from a chair to their wheel chair. Of course some money goes to research too. This cause is really important to my family. Grandpa accepted his fate, but he wanted to know that ALS would not always result in the end that it did for him. Click here if you would like to support me. http://web.alsa.org/site/TR/Walks/IowaWalk?px=2460107&pg=personal&fr_id=5777