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According to the Parkinson's Disease Association
-Parkinson's disease may actually affect more than one million Americans, if estimated misdiagnosed and undiagnosed cases are combined with the current 500,000 documented cases in the U.S.
-Considering the total at an estimated one million cases, more people suffer from Parkinson's disease than from MS, MD and Lou Gehrig's disease combined.
-Parkinson's disease is the second-most prevalent chronic neurological disorder; only Alzheimer's disease surpasses it in the number of patients afflicted.
-The cause of Parkinson's disease is unknown.
-The cost of Parkinson's disease in the U.S. - including medical and surgical treatments, social security payments, patients' loss of income and other factors - is estimated at $25 billion each year.
Our Mission:
To inspire community involvement and raise awareness for Parkinson’s Disease, that will fund research to ultimately find a cure.
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Our story:
In late 2004 life was good, I had just finished my Bachelors degree after a 20 year hiatus and I was happily married. I thought I had finally made it, I was going to finally live up to my potential that everyone said I was not doing. It was just then when I was riding the highest wave of my life I was blind sided with the news I had Young Onset Parkinson’s disease (YOPD).
It was like someone was dangling that carrot of success in front of me on the edge of a cliff and instead of giving me the carrot they pushed me off the cliff. I thought this cannot be happening, every time I get close to success it gets pulled out of my reach. It was this experience that has changed my view on just what success is.
My best friend, who also is my beautiful wife Ann Marie of almost nine years, decided that she was not going to let me wallow in self pity. She began to research this strange new thing in our life called YOPD and educate herself on what was to come and how to deal with it. During her search she came across The Michael J. Fox Foundation site (MJFF); which has a tremendous amount of information for the newly diagnosed as well as general information about current treatments. I am and have always been a fan of Mr. Fox from Family Ties to all his movies but I never thought we would have something in common and never thought it would be YOPD. Ann found on his site a new program they were getting ready to launch later in 2005 called Team Fox for Parkinson’s Research. This was to be a grassroots community based fundraising arm of the MJFF giving anybody the opportunity and tools to organize or host a fundraising event to benefit Parkinson’s research as this is currently no cure.
Ann joined the soon to be Team Fox as “Team Glowienke†but did not tell me of it as this time. I was still busy being mad at the world because I thought YOPD was going to steal my life, boy was I wrong. Ann began planning a walk-a-thon as her first event with Team Fox and finally let me in on the secret. I was overwhelmed that she had done all this and was not sure if it would work. As she was planning the event we started to work together of a name and finally came up with the idea of Focus on a Cure because no matter what we do we want to stay focused on our ultimate goal of funding and finding a cure. To date Focus on a Cure has raised over $11,000 for Team Fox and we hope to keep pushing that number up as the year goes on with our walk event and other things currently being planned. Because of the efforts of my wife The Focus on a Cure Foundation for Parkinson’s is no a official no-profit company. We have grown our network of friends not only here on myspace but nationally and internationally within the Parkinson’s community.
This is where my new definition of success comes in. I used to think I needed to make a certain amount of money to be considered a success and have the finer things in life to be viewed as successful. I now know that being a success is to be able o look at your life and be satisfied with who you are not what you have in the bank. I have been blessed in my life with many things, a loving wife, a great family and great friends: but my greatest blessing is the burden of Parkinson’s because it has allowed me to become involved in something bigger than me and given me the ability to be a better person than I thought was possible. Success to me is not so much impressing others with what I have but impressing the guy that looks back at me in the mirror every morning with what I give; it is because of Ann and her love and support I am able to be the person I am today.Thanks for reading our story and being part of Focusing on a Cure for Parkinson’s disease. Together we can make this happen!!!
"Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored."