They were both still in their early 40s, a loving couple with two young kids in school. The husband had become seriously ill and, at first, they didn’t know why or what it was about. But then the wife, 41, learned her husband was likely to die within two years, because he was suffering from a rare and dangerously elusive disease called multiple myeloma.
In response, this working wife, who doesn’t seek acknowledgment nor being identified in this account, moved into action and did what she believed was most necessary. She knew instinctively and immediately she’d have to find the right person with the authority to provide potential aid for her husband and all ongoing, and future, sufferers of this fatal disease. Multiple myeloma, a rare form of bone cancer that can affect many organs, requires a very specific and expensive medication to extend lives, or else its sufferers would be faced with a no-hope situation and die quickly.
The determined wife met with a successful entrepreneurial acquaintance who also had the disease and had already personally created the first Multiple Myeloma Research Chair in Canada. Recalling that man’s determination — “He wouldn’t take ‘No’ for an answer — to promote the need for more financial help for people trying to combat the disease,” she said. Make no mistake: She wouldn’t take “No” either.
Her true and enduring aim was to put all her energy into the cause and somehow provide essential coverage to all multiple myeloma.