Yesterday Colton and I was challenged to do the ALS ice bucket challenge by a wonderful friend Nan Hayes who so happens to be the mother of Colton’s favorite Maryland basketball player Eric Hayes. I use to look at these videos and think they were really cool because of the awareness they brought to ALS , also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. I thought that but to be honest in the back of my mind I prayed no one would ever challenge me. That is until Nan challenged me , and I realized this is my 5 minutes to inspire someone to give to something so worthy. I first would like to take the moment to speak of a wonderful friend, one who I actually seen at Wal-mart over the weekend. His name is Randy Floyd. Randy has been living with being diagnosed with ALS since 2012. Now I would like to read something from his ALS donation page. ALS has affected my family for many years , as far back as I can remember as a child. It started with my Grandfather on my Mother’s side and has taken the lives of 12 of my family members so far with 6 more of us living with and fighting it now. I watched my Mom suffer and die from ALS at the age of 47. My twin brother and sister (Michael & Michelle) was only 12 years old at the time and still lived at home with her and took care of her on a daily basis (along with other family members that helped out) But 12 year old kids shouldnt have to do that ,they should be playing sports and enjoying school playing with friends and doing things that other kids do, but they didnt they were there feeding , bathing , giving medicine and taking care of Mom and I never heard them complain about it. I remember years ago thinking that people at the of age 50 was old but Im 51 now and in my mind I am still a young man but my body tells me Im not. I am already at the point in my life where I cant do allot of things that I used to do or things that I always wanted to do one day because of ALS. I am dreading the day that my loving and wonderful wife and daughter has to do everything for me like feeding me and waiting on me all the time. It’s not supposed to be like that I am the husband , father and brother that is supposed to take care of all my family but unless God performs a miracle in my life and heals me...that’s not going to happen. That is the reality of what this disease can do to a family. I would also like to mention that since Randy had written the above other family members have been diagnosed and others have passed away. I would also like to add that there are family members who fear of having the gene that one carries that their fear tells them they don’t want to know. So now to my challenges, I would first like to challenge all of Surry county , we live in a community that has a family that has lost this many to a disease and we need to step up and take care of our own. Yes there has been much support for Randy and his whole family but I for one know we can do better. I am not asking you all to do the ALS ice bucket challenge but I am asking you to give to Randy’s team called “ Floyd’s fighters “ at the link below. I am giving and I will be up front it will be a $25.00 donation, that may not seem like much but I wanted to put that out there because no amount is too small. Now to the people I challenge. First I would like to challenge one of the most giving businesses in our county, one that always leads the way when it comes to helping out our community. I challenge the owners of 13 Bones . Angie I will leave it up to you to get the rest of the owners involved and from me to you THANK YOU for all you do. My next challenge will be my niece Brittany Andrews , Britt read about this disease and see how bad it is. My last Challenge is to Taylor Bouma however I do not expect him to take the challenge because he is fighting his own fight with cancer however I do challenge any of his friends reading this to take the ice bucket challenge for him. Taylor I am sure you will get a kick out of all these friends pouring buckets of ice water on their heads. Colton would like to challenge his cousin Abby Smith , his teammates Tripp McMillen and Luke Bruner . Parents here are your chances to educate your children about this horrific disease and about supporting others. Thank you and most importantly PRAY for a cure !!!! https://youtube/watch?v=gn3izep8kXg&list=UU8isLBteIadqBOBsntJQ9Qw Here is a link to Randys ALS donation page. webnc.alsa.org/goto/floydsfighters-randy
Posted on: Tue, 19 Aug 2014 23:23:26 +0000