So!! What was the point??

All credit to you Peter, playing the hand we are dealt as best we can is all any of us can do.

As for Kristine - better to have loved and lost etc.

a good accountant can work just as effectively from a wheel chair as any other chair.
Significant physical dexterity and strength in not a requirement normally associated with Accounting.

I think onemack must be jealous of you.

I just wonder how far he could walk (or ride) in your shoes?

Dear Peter

Thank you very much for your heartwarming and insightful article. What a role model you are for other people with extreme physical disabilities.

I have nursed some people with your condition, so I have a very good idea of what you have been through - especially the taunting when people think you are drunk.

You have heaps of courage. I wish you well in your ventures.

From my experience, when nurses cross the line and marry their patients, it usually does not work out for very long, and that has nothing to do with your degenerative ataxia.

Cheers mate
Kay

Thank you Peter for such a refreshing piece! Rest assured biographies like the one you have sketched continue to inspire many a soul.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Peter,
You are a bloody inspiration mate, I have a friend in a chair, who also has made a success of his life, plays wheelchair basketball holds down a full time job at a recruitment agency, and generally inspires all who cross his path. When people with disabilities see a story such as yours, we feel hope in our own situations.

Your next step is to put all that knowledge to good use, either in employment, or your own business, or perhaps inspiring young people to achieve what you have achieved, congratulations on a job extremely well done.
Regards, Shaun

This article comes at a very good time. My teenage daughter is having to deal with a close teenage friend who has been dignosed with the disease and her friend isn't coping well, and neither is my daughter who really doesn't know how to help her. The things that my daughter has done to try to help, like letting adults know what her friend was doing as she feared her friend would be successful in taking her life, has only made her friend talk less to her about it. Her friend talks about how life is not worth living, my daughter doesn't know how to help her anymore. Its a difficult situation for all. This beautiful young woman doesn't see a future as she watches her body deteriorate. She is such an intelligent girl!

I will tell my daughter to direct her friend to your post as maybe she will see that others with the same condition can be successful in life and are living a fulfilling life.