THE LEGACY

Presented by Barbara Byer - October 27, 2009

Thank you for being here today.  My views on motherhood and Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis at first might seem disparate but do have meaningful connections for me and hopefully for all of you as well.

As the mother of five children, I envisioned them becoming fulfilled, productive adults who would realize their dreams.  I hoped that our parent child relationship would shift into a peer relationship, one that would contain mutual support and care for each other.

As a child development specialist, I’ve been fascinated by human behavior, character and temperament.  What makes one person stand up in the face of overwhelming odds and another succumb to the devastation.  What makes one group of siblings band together and another choose such separate and distant lives that communication between them becomes non-existent.   What makes one family turn away when one of them is confronted with a fatal illness and another pull together.

Read the presentation in its entirety - The Legacy.