I can still remember the resonating sound of those fateful words: "They said I have Lou Gehrig's disease. They ruled out everything else." That day led to an emotional breakdown for me. My first love from high school, my husband and I have been on and off since we were fifteen years old. We are now 23. Somewhere along the way, we married, and had a beautiful daughter. We recently reconciled, and have two beautiful children, Nevaeh and Nazir. I am 8 months pregnant with our third child. And now this.

When I heard about my husband's diagnosis, I turned to the Internet for answers. What I found out wasn't what I'd hoped for. A degenerative auto-immune disease, there is no cure. Life expectancy: 2 to 5 years for most people. If he's a lucky one, he might survive up to ten years, but the chances of that are slim. In a nutshell: an extremely poor prognosis. This disease eats up the motor nerves in the spinal cord, which causes the person to rapidly lose control of their voluntary muscles. That means everything goes, from walking and using a pencil, to swallowing and even breathing. That's the cause of death- the person simply ceases to breathe.

All we can think about now is why us? My husband, an active duty Marine veteran, fresh home from Iraq, who has never used drugs, smoked, or otherwise abused his body... why is he afflicted with this? All I do is cry thinking about the fact that he won't live to see our children walk the stage. The stress is building to such a level that I don't even sleep at night anymore. I sit up until at least 4 or 5 a.m. on the computer searching for answers. All I get is more of the same depressing news. The clock is ticking; our days together are numbered. \

My husband is still functional for the most part; he has a lot of spastic muscle cramps, but he still plays basketball and goes to the gym to work out. He has the body of an athlete, and I think he is in denial about what is happening to him. He's been diagnosed for less than a month, but he has yet to talk about it much. He behaves as if nothing serious is going on; when I asked how his last doctor's visit went, he responded,"They're starting me on this medication that's supposed to give me three or four months longer to live." He made that statement in a manner not unlike one he would use if he were to say,"My day at work was good. Everything went smoothly according to schedule." It's almost scary sometimes, because I think he is like a ticking bomb, moving steadily closer to an impending explosion. Common sense tells me he is angry, bitter, and scared, but he finds a way to make every day one filled with laughter. From all outward appearances, he doesn't have a care in the world.

As his wife, and mother of three children, I feel like I have a responsibility to maintain hope in our lives. I portray the happy wife, content to be a homemaker. I provide love and support to my husband; the kids are ages four and two; too young to know what's going on. There are a lot of things I wish I would have done differently over the years, but it's too late for regrets. All I can do is grit my teeth and push forward, struggling to look for hope in the bleakest times. I may regret the past, but I definitely have the capabilities to ensure a brighter future for my husband. Every day is more of the same; I hope for a miracle and I pray for strength.

Learn more about this author, Monica Hardy.
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