A Life Impossible
Living with ALS: Finding Peace and Wisdom Within a Fragile Existence
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- $14.99
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- $14.99
Publisher Description
From NFL player Steve Gleason, a powerful, inspiring memoir of love, heartbreak, resilience, family, and remarkable triumph in the face of ALS
“Steve Gleason has changed the world.” –Roger Goodell, NFL Commissioner • "An extraordinary book...A Life Impossible will change the way people cope, think, and live." –Mike Lupica, co-author with James Patterson of 12 Months to Live
In 2011, three years after leaving the NFL, Steve Gleason was diagnosed with ALS, a terminal disease that takes away the ability to move, talk, and breathe. Doctors gave him three years to live. He was thirty-three years old. As Steve says, he is now ten years past his expiration date.
His memoir is the chronicle of a remarkable life, one filled with optimism and joy, despite the trauma and pain and despair he has experienced. Writing using eye-tracking technology, Gleason covers his pre-ALS life through the highs and lows of his NFL career with the New Orleans Saints, where he made one of the most memorable plays in Saints history, leading to a victory in the first post-Katrina home game, uplifting the city, making him a hero, and reflected in a nine-foot bronze statue outside the Superdome. Then came his heartbreaking diagnosis. Gleason lost all muscle function, he now uses Stephen Hawking-like technology to communicate, and breathes with the help of a ventilator. This book captures Gleason and his wife Michel’s unmatched resilience as they reinvent their lives, refuse to succumb to despair, and face his disease realistically and existentially.
This unsparing portrait argues that a person's true strength does not reside solely in one’s body but also in the ability to face unfathomable adversity and still be able to love and treasure life.
Customer Reviews
Energizing
A bare all look into life with ALS and all the different ways it strips down the body and mental hopes and barriers of both those living with it and their families. Touched every emotion while reading and ultimately left me energized to continue exploring all parts of life and being human…and to embrace the emotions that make us unique. GREAT book, and a quick read.