Page created by: Kathryn Koch

My father had so many passions in life - poetry, his church, musical theater, soccer - and he passed all of those loves on to me. It's with that gratitude and love in my heart that I wish to create this page in his memory.

I remember how frightened his PD diagnosis made him, and us, his family. Only in his late 50s, dad felt "too young" and was further baffled that "no one else in our family has it!" We struggled for over a decade to maintain his quality of life, even as worsening symptoms made activities of his day-to-day life progressively difficult.

On his last day, I sat by his bed and held his hand, promising him that he would never be forgotten. The irony of his passing at the beginning of Parkinson's Awareness Month hasn't been lost on me for a moment.

The best tribute I can think of is to help fundraise to continue research and one day utterly eradicate this devastating disease from the planet.