Countdown to Glory: 27 to go

THE COUNTDOWN CONTINUES. 27 DAYS TO GLORY!!!

I'm gonna do something a little different tonight. I'm not here to talk trash about 27 compared to 33. You probably already knew that - 27 is a sad year for most. It was the age Kurt Cobain, Robert Johnson, Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison and Janis Joplin died. It's thenumber of World Series wins the New York

Yankees have bought. So don't even worry about 27 being worse than 33. It is.

Instead, I'm going to go personal on this. 27 was how old I was the year I proposed to my wife. Under incredibly romantic circumstances, I pulled the ring out from my glove compartment, car parked in the garage got down on one knee (careful to avoid spilled motor oil) and told her that I wanted to spend the rest of my life with her. My wife and I have a special relationship when it came to marriage. See, on our very first date she kind of proposed to me. We were in the embryonic stages of just getting to know one another, and she had told me that s

he had been diagnosed with lupus (an auto-immune disease related to arthritis). Apparently in her college years she'd run into a couple of relationships where once her lupus had come up, cool breeze college dudes weren't as interested in her. I'm not sure what exactly I said in response to her (I was trying to impress her with my uncanny ability to pair multiple bottles of wine with each of the tapas before us), but apparently it wasn't the frightened running away she'd heard before. She said "oh, so you're the guy I'm supposed to marry."

First date. True story. And I don't want to be too hard on the previous suitors, because I'd be lying if the fact she has lupus didn't affect our lives (naturally hers more than mine). Lupus is a challenge. It affects her entire body, physically and emotionally. Somedays it hurts to get out of bed. Somedays it feels like someone is pressing down on her shoulders, trying to make her kneel. Somedays she's worried about wearing white, because she doesn't want to ruin her shirt in case she gets a nosebleed. Somedays she feels like she can't do at all what everyone on earth her age seemingly can do with ease. And that hurts, emotionally. Lupus is a chronic illness, and it's not going away soon. She has to deal with it every day, and I need to do my part too.

So back to 27, there I was, proposing to her. And I am 100% honest with you when I say that the fact she has lupus did not cross my mind as I knelt in the garage. I love her no matter what. What lupus does to her body only adds to my love for her - my respect for the challenges she overcomes, my pride when she fights through every tough day.

Fast forward three years. Kerry is now 27. And she's pregnant with my daughter Claire. When first diagnosed, Kerry didn't think she'd ever have kids. And it's easy to see why, as an observer of what pregnancy does to someone with lupus. Pregnancy is brutal on any woman's physique. It move bones around, adds weight where the body isn't used to it, wreaks havoc on digestive systems, causes massive emotional and psychological stress. And for someone with lupus, all those areas aren't exactly running at full capacity under non-pregnant circumstances.
See, there's a shorthand equation we throw around at the AF: losing one pound of weight reduces the pressure on each knee by 4 pounds. It's a motivation tool to get people moving and in better shape to reduce the risk of joint pain. Well, my wife felt excruciating joint pain when she was in diesel shape. Tack on the weight that a baby brings, and there's serious joint pain constantly assaulting her. Plus, take away normal sleep patterns (because sleeping on your

stomach isn't possible). And you can't eat a lot of things that make you feel good. Pregnancy stinks for anyone. It's horrendous for someone with a chronic illness. I'm not trying to elicit sympathy for her, just telling it how it is for anyone in her position.

So here she is, taking the brunt of incredible pain and stress, trying her damnedest to get the baby here. But, as is the case with almost every expectant mother who has a chronic illness, there are always complications. High blood pressure suggests preeclampsia. Pain and other symptoms suggest that, aside from the negative impact of having a baby growing inside of her, she's been facing a particularly virulent lupus flare.

Thankfully, Kerry has good doctors - perinatologists who know how rough lupus can be when paired with pregnancy - who know what to look out for and how to make things a little easier along the way. But good doctors couldn't keep her from nearly 3 weeks in the hospital immediately prior to the early-induced birth. Or the two prior admissions to the hospital.

That's just what a chronic illness does. It's not something she asked for, but it's something she was sure as hell going to overcome to get Claire here healthy.

And that's just what my 27 year old beautiful wife did. She fought her hardest and gave birth to an amazing 6 pound 3 ounce girl who didn't even have the common courtesy to look like the mother who worked so hard getting her here.

So that's what 27 means to me. It's the year I proposed to my wife. Though it wasn't even in the furthest reaches of my mind at the time, it was the year I signed on to fight lupus side-by-side with her. I'd never say that it affects me 1/1000th as much as her, but I'd also be lying if I said lupus didn't affect me at all. But I'll take it on, learning from the example my wife shows. And 27 is the year she really showed it. Lupus made her life miserable, and tried its worst to take away our daughter. But because of my wife's faith, strength and will, lupus lost this battle.

If my first 6 emails have you wondering if I think all this fundraising for the Arthritis Walk is just a joke, well, I haven't really given you the whole story up to now. See, just because the signature at the bottom of this email shows that I work for the Arthritis Foundation, it doesn't mean that this is just a job for me. I've seen the effects of chronic illness first hand. I know that because of research and public health programs funded by and supported by the Arthritis

Foundation, more doctors know how to deal with rheumatic diseases - more doctors like the perinatologists who helped save my daughter's and my wife's lives 3 years ago.

And my son's and my wife's lives just a year ago too.

Every dollar we raise, and every person we can reach by spreading the word really does mean more than I could possibly put into words. This isn't a just a laughing matter, or a job, to me. It's every breath my family takes. It's every smile I see on their faces. It's every Friday night on the back porch grilling burgers while my wife sips a cold one, my daughter blows bubbles and my son laughs his head off at her. It's not just improving the lives of 46 million Americans with a form of arthritis, it's about everything that means anything in my life.

So join TEAM 33 and help the millions of people, like my wife, my kids and me, who are affected by Arthritis. We make it easy for you to join TEAM 33 by following the link below:

http://www.kintera.org/faf/r.asp?t=4&i=312420&u=312420-211716341

Join TEAM 33. Sign up. Spread the word to your friends and family. Join us at the walk. Give a few bucks for a great cause. Homebrew a delicious chelada-style lager with the salty tears shed while writing this email. And we'll have cake.

26 more emails to come. No, they won't all be like this going forward. Unless it works and more people JOIN TEAM 33!!!

If you have any questions about how incredibly awesome TEAM 33 is, give me a call or send me an email. Thanks again!