Dear Friends,

I’m writing to ask for your money. Why you ask? Because I’m a badass. Yes, you heard that right, I’m, excuse my French, a fucking bad-ass. Why am I such a bad-ass, you say?

I have spent most of my life as a professional patient, going from doctor’s offices, ER’s, and the nation’s best hospitals, all in search of an elusive diagnosis. My first big stay was, at the young age of 10, where I spent a month at LaRabida children’s hospital. No matter how sick I got, no answers could be found. So, I forged a life where I lived with my illness and my illness lived with me.

Then, starting in 2012, the dike, that was my illness, was overtaking this little dutch boy. By 2016, I had lost my job, friends, and in some sense, I lost a sense of who I was. And yet, I persisted. I built a thriving law practice, which broke so many barriers. I mean I’m a disabled, solo-practioner, working from his house, who never practiced a day in his life in a law firm, AND YET, I service large public corporations, private equity firms, venture capital firms. I often partner with, or sit across the table from, some of the largest firms in the country, to serve my clients. I work on referral only and have doubled my business in the last year. A managing partner at one large law firm once said to me, what I have done is truly unparalleled, but having done it with my disability is a marvel.

By the way, in the time that my disease has been the worst, Kelley and I, have raised two amazing kids, who are doing incredible things. This in the middle of utter uncertainty, chaos and a lot of other bad words.

So here’s the rub. It’s not all sunshine and roses. In January of this year, I took a simple blood test and found out I have, and have had, an incurable, extremely rare, incredibly painful, progressively disabling disease called Stiff Person Syndrome. It’s literally a 1 in 1,000,000 disease affecting less than 400 people in the US. A disease, that, based upon the stats, should have killed me long ago. But I’m here and I’m getting up each day looking for meaning and purpose in the midst of all the incredible difficulties this disease brings to me.

Here's the ask. Once I took on the disabled identity, I became a part of this amazing community of people who are also disabled. If heroism is the act of doing something difficult in the face of adverse circumstances, each-and-every single one of them are heroes. Unfortunately, most of the time, people in the disabled community are either overlooked, or worse, given pity. Let me tell you that PWD (people with disabilities) want to lead normal lives – go to work, raise kids, get promoted, be philanthropic, and most of all noticed. Noticed for who they are, as an individual, and what they themselves bring to the table.

I’m fortunate enough to work with an organization that supports these efforts. And each and every day we are moving disability into the spotlight in companies, government, civic organizations and anywhere else we can show that PWD’s can lead.

On this, my 54^th birthday, I’d like to ask you to be a bad-ass yourself and contribute financially to Disability Lead and help me normalize being disabled.

Thank you for the privilege of your time and thank you in advance for your generosity.   

Donations submitted to this fundraising campaign will benefit Disability Lead.