a friend talks

When one’s destiny crosses another’s.  From Thierry Consigny It is probably not by chance that you are reading this, nothing happens just by chance. Thierry Latran is just like anyone else. An investment banker, he  has 3  wonderful sons. A year ago, his body started to fail him. He is just over 45 years old! Was it too much sport or too many flights, too many closing of deals? Accumulated fatigue, anxiety? Physiotherapy fails to return his strength. He sees one Doctor and another…Doubt starts to get hold of him: is he losing it? Overdoing it? Is it depression? He is worn out and weak. He doesn’t understand anymore. He has nothing, Doctors keep telling him, there is nothing wrong with him… If there’s nothing wrong with him, he would know this himself. You would know as he knew, when your muscles start to weaken. If there is nothing wrong with him, it’s because a disease which is nothing still exists today, a disease of unknown cause, without a biomarker, without a way to diagnose, with limited research.  There is nothing wrong with him but this illness will eventually kill him. He has ALS (Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis), he has motor neuron disease. As soon as a name was given to this nothing which is wearing him down, he searches on the internet. What he finds out is terrifying: “a disease which manifests itself by a progressive and complete muscle wasting of the four limbs and paralysis of the tongue, glottis and lungs”. Very difficult to diagnose and untreatable.  According to the statistics, 6000 to 8000 people suffer from ALS in France. Thierry is no more a superman than you are. For the first month following his diagnosis, he live in a state of reclusion …What sparkle makes him react at his darkest moment of despair? “Even evil serves good” says Saint Augustin. Thierry has faith, more than ever. The Doctors’ helplessness, the suffering for himself and his relatives will make him react; the affection and exhortation of his friends will save him. Not from death but from despair. Despite the exhaustion, despite the emotional and physical suffering, he gets his spirit back. Is the disease going to kill him? He is going to help killing the disease. Thierry  makes a promise to do everything in his power to ensure that this disease disappears from the list of incurable diseases. Perhaps Thierry himself won’t see the cure. But with his Foundation he will see progress in ALS research. And his children, his sons, will know that he did his best to ensure that one day, a therapy may exist for this disease to whom Charcot gave his name. Today, at the time you are reading this document, the Foundation starts with the living spirit of a man who is far from giving up, giving in, who’s fighting, not for himself but for others after him. This man is like you, this man is you. He is exceptional perhaps, most probably as surely you are.  He says it himself, with a very gentle voice which calls for help as much as it provides strength: “I am not a hero. I am always on the edge. The mind is strong, but…on the edge. This Foundation is an obligation to live. Why slave away in pain, in physical deterioration? It is a duty to fight for the children.” His? Yours?