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Saving lives one baby step at a time
SOPHIE'S WALK IS TAKING PLACE AT A CITY NEAR YOU!
30 September - 1 October 2006
Oh my goodness! The following story is truly REMARKABLE. You know, if this guy can run these triathalons every week just to see the look on his son's face, I can't but think of what each and every one of us would do to even HAVE this opportunity. You HAVE to read this story...and while you do, remember that it only takes an hour to walk 5k (3 miles). Save a baby's life. If you can't walk, volunteer at a Sophie's Walk taking place near you. It there's not a walk near you, collect donations. A contributions form is attached. Or you can donate through PayPal. Simply reply to this email to host a last minute walk in your town. Vasa previa is one tragedy we CAN do something about!
Oh my....
----Original Message----
This a remarkable Father/Son story. Turn up the volume because the song really says it all. Read the story before you click on the link at the end or if the link doesn't work, do a cut and paste into your browser. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4B-r8KJhlE This is one of the best emails I've ever seen. Please take the time to read. The video is even better, but you have to read the story first. It will probably make you cry, but it is a remarkable story.
[From Sports Illustrated, By Rick Reilly]
I try to be a good father. Work nights to pay for their text messaging. Take them to swimsuit shoots. But compared with Dick Hoyt, I stink. Eighty-five times he's pushed his disabled son, Rick, 26.2 miles in marathons. Eight times he's not only pushed him 26.2 miles in a wheelchair but also towed him 2.4 miles in a dinghy while swimming and pedaled him 112 miles in a seat on the handlebars--all in the same day. Dick's also pulled him cross-country skiing, taken him on his back mountain climbing and once hauled him across the U.S. on a bike. Makes taking your son bowling look a little lame, right? And what has Rick done for his father? Not much--except save his life.
This love story began in Winchester, Mass., 43 years ago, when Rick was strangled by the umbilical cord during birth, leaving him brain-damaged and unable to control his limbs. ``He'll be a vegetable the rest of his life;'' Dick says doctors told him and his wife, Judy, when Rick was nine months old. ``Put him in an institution.'' But the Hoyts weren't buying it. They noticed the way Rick's eyes followed them around the room.
When Rick was 11 they took him to the engineering department at Tufts University and asked if there was anything to help the by communicate. "No way,'' Dick says he was told. "There's nothing going on in his brain.'' "Tell him a joke,'' Dick countered. They did. Rick laughed. Turns out a lot was going on in his brain. Rigged up with a computer that allowed him to control the cursor by touching a switch with the side of his head, Rick was finally able to communicate. First words? "Go Bruins!'' And after a high school classmate was paralyzed in an accident and the school organized a charity run for him, Rick pecked out, "Dad, I want to do that.''
Yeah, right. How was Dick, a self-described ``porker'' who never ran more than a mile at a time, going to push his son five miles? Still, he tried. "Then it was me who was handicapped,'' Dick says. ``I was sore for two weeks.'' That day changed Rick's life. "Dad,'' he typed, "when we were running,it felt like I wasn't disabled anymore!'' And that sentence changed Dick's life. He became obsessed with giving Rick that feeling as often as he could. He got into such hard-belly shape that he and Rick were ready to try the 1979 Boston Marathon.
"No way,'' Dick was told by a race official. The Hoyts weren't quite a single runner, and they weren't quite a wheelchair competitor. For a few years Dick and Rick just joined the massive field and ran anyway, then they found a way to get into the race officially: In 1983 they ran another marathon so fast they made the qualifying time for Boston the following year. Then somebody said, "Hey, Dick, why not a triathlon?''
Visit http://IVPF.org to learn about vasa previa. It only takes a moment to diagnose life...
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