blind skier with CMT

[Guest guest]

I stumbled across this website by accident and I am truly inspired.

Thaddeus has CMT, is blind, and ski's.

http://pursueyourhappiness.com/about.html website has photos.

About Thaddeus - Thaddeus Neumann is the second of five children and was

born in Washington DC. He came down with Juvenile Diabetes at the age of

seven. After a fairly normal childhood Thaddeus started noticing the

affects of this prolific disease right before entering college. Along

with the normal task of taking insulin injections four times a day,

Thaddeus contracted another disease called Charcot-Marie-Tooth (CMT).

CMT is a degenerative disease that affects the extremities, in his case

his feet. The CMT caused atrophy in his calf muscles and through time

totally deformed his feet.

Thaddeus attended The University of land and majored in Accounting.

He made his way across campus in more different types of orthopedic

shoes than the most ardent marathon runner would in the same amount of

time. During his senior year a thread like fuzz appeared in the upper

right side of his left eye. He slowly started to lose his vision and

then the same thread appeared in his right eye. Four days after getting

his diploma, Thaddeus' vision got progressively worse until he lost

total sight ten months later, due to diabetic retinopathy. The same

month he lost his sight, his kidneys failed and soon he was put on

dialysis, and as he later said, entered the world of, " The Walking

Dead. " Being hooked up to huge blood cleansing machines four hours a

day, three days a week, literally sucked the life out of him. Constantly

exhausted and often depressed he kept up this routine for a year and a

half. The morning of January 3, 1988 proved to be a pivotal juncture in

his life. After being on the kidney transplant wait list for just 42

days, the transplant coordinator called and said they had a match.

Amazingly, it was a rare perfect match.

Thaddeus had a new lease on life and said if he could walk, he would be

dangerous. Armed with new vigor he attacked life with great zest. The

following year he landed a job teaching computer skills to other people

with visual impairments, a month later he went to The Guiding Eyes For

The Blind - guide dog school - and there he met his best friend for the

next decade, his guide dog Jasper.

On a vacation to Colorado he rediscovered his love of the mountains and

the thrill of skiing. He soon quit his job and decided to pursue his new

goal of becoming a member of the United States disabled ski team. Since

his feet were his worst enemy he had to use a mono ski and to this day

he remains the only known competitive blind mono skier in the world.

After a couple of years pursuing his happiness, he learned of a foot

specialist in Seattle, Washington. After the ski season Thaddeus made an

appointment with the doctor and flew to Seattle, his brother s

drove up from Los Angeles to meet Thaddeus and bring him to the doctor

to see what they thought could be done to correct his feet. They visited

the doctor and after hearing the options Thaddeus knew in the back of

his mind what his next move would be.

One year later, Thaddeus had both feet corrected. The operation was

complicated and risky; however, a tremendous success. Today, Thaddeus

can walk barefoot and take a shower standing. For the previous 15 years,

Thaddeus had to crawl around and sit in the shower. Three months after

the life changing operation, Thaddeus had to decide to put Jasper to

sleep. Jasper had a basketball size tumor wrapped around his intestines.

The cancer was not treatable. Not only did Thaddeus miss his guide dog,

he suffered four minor strokes caused from diabetes. With physical

therapy and determination his paralysis on his left side of his body

slowly regained its normal function.

For the next year Thaddeus was without a companion and guide dog. The

next ski season, Thaddeus tried to ski standing up again. It is unheard

of making the transition from Mono skiing to standup skiing. Once again,

Thaddeus beat incredible odds. Thaddeus' boldness and risk-taking

attitude enabled him to ski like he did when he was an able bodied

child. Today,Thaddeus lives in beautiful Colorado. He is guided by his

new guide dog, Hobbs, and continues to enjoy an eventful and amazing

life. His next accomplishment will be to play goalie,or as his brother

likes to say,´backstop´, on a roller blade hockey team.