Borsellino: I can kick the denial, not the disease
ROB BORSELLINO • REGISTER COLUMNIST • February 23, 2005


I was slurring my words, I was tired and I felt weak. Friends kept asking if I was drinking again. Finally, I went to see a doctor.

I figured I'd give him my $20 co-pay, get a scrip for some useless pills, then go home and wait until I felt better.

But the doctor ran some tests and was spooked by what he saw. He sent me to a second doctor — a nerve specialist.

That guy ran more tests and at the end of the session he's telling me I have some fatal, incurable, exotic-sounding disease — amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.


Also called Lou Gehrig's Disease.

Then he's telling me most people only live a few years with this.

It's been a few months, and since that day I've had several other doctors around the country tell me pretty much the same thing.

Each time I hear it I'm in denial. I find myself sitting there avoiding the important stuff:

I won't be there for my sons' weddings, and I won't see the grandkids.

What about a will and life insurance?

Do I want to live strapped up to some breathing machine and a voice box?

Instead, I'm listening to the doctor and thinking about what a lousy year I'm having.

First my hair is getting thinner, and I have these bags under my eyes. My 29-inch waist is up to 30 and growing. The Yankees lost, and the Republicans won.

Or I'm sitting there trying to think of some positive angle, trying to find some lines to lighten things up.

I'm toying with the name. At least it's called Lou Gehrig's Disease and not Steinbrenner Syndrome or Dizzy Dean Disorder.

And once the word gets out, folks I run into will be asking about my health instead of getting in my face about the Register's liberal bias.

Sometimes it works, it takes my mind off what's really going on.

But then I try to button a shirt or make a phone call sounding sober, and I'm slapped back down to reality.

It happens when I look at my night table and see the little glass angel Laurie Gallo sent me from the Bronx, the angel blessed by Father Grippo at St. Theresa's.

It happens when I wake up in the middle of the night and my wife's lying there awake, thinking about how we went from planning our life as empty nesters to worrying about survival.

Or I hear that I'm being remembered in a Sikh temple in New Delhi at a prayer service put together by my in-laws.

Or a friend of a friend e-mails about a miracle-worker, a shaman in Brazil who might be worth seeing.

A half-dozen people are net surfing every day, checking out stem-cell research in Beijing and hearing about those rare cases of folks who live with this for as long as 30 years.

The phone rings, and it's Neal in San Francisco, Joey in Jersey or D.J. down in Kansas, old friends, guys I haven't talked with in years. They heard, and show up in Des Moines a few days later.

I find myself talking with St. Jude, the patron saint of lost causes.

In the newsroom a guy I hardly know says: "If you or your family need anything, please tell me. I'm serious. Anything I can do."

Word has started getting around, and I'm hearing that from dozens of people. It's humbling.

I've gotten get-well cards from strangers, lunch and dinner invites from business types, and teary-eyed hugs from politicians.

Several folks asked when I was going to go public, when was I going to write about this.

I kept thinking: "When I have something to say."

Then the other night I was looking back over the past few months and realized there was a lot to be said.

And I was ready to say it.

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To read about amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, see www.alsa.org/