In July 2002, Denise Jeppesen '93 was diagnosed with ALS, or Lou Gehrig's disease. As she became increasingly confined and immobilized, she kept in touch with friends and former professors, emailing them essays composed at her bedside keyboard.

January 2, 2004: I received my sign boards yesterday. They consist of three pieces of copy paper, containing 22 basic words (like blanket and BM), large print alphabet letters and 28 crude drawings of important items, activities, people and places - i.e., male doctor, female nurse, bedpan, bed, food, hurt, medicine and one odd picture labeled "dressing."

I've stared at that drawing from every angle for hours, and it still looks like a pineapple with a turban on its spiked top. Then again, perhaps it's a turkey standing upright with actual dressing loaded inside. If so, that's an important one to include with the 28 pictures I now have available with which to communicate. It will come in especially handy when I need to say to someone, "Me tired, pain, need lie down, want pillow, blanket, turkey with dressing, pills and more bathroom."

I go through phases. They were quarterly, monthly, then weekly and now daily. I did Noble-Spiritual Sunday, Morose yesterday. Today was Rage. Tonight feels a bit mellower. Tomorrow I cycle back around to Vulnerable-Gentle, Loving-Introspective, or at least something less venomous than Rage. My family, I'm sure, prefers my less active, agitated phases, but I don’t choose phases, they choose me.

Rage actually chose me awhile ago, but needed time to crystallize. First, I went to an ob-gyn specialist to obliterate periods. I figured ALS demanded my full attention. The doctor prescribed a shot intended to last three months. No luck. So she sent another shot via Hospice. No luck. Next option, a patch. Ninety days later, my daughter called the specialist's office to ask what the heck happened to the doctor's nifty plan. Nurse Sensitivity said, "No offense, but isn't your mom terminal, anyway?" Um, that would be a big fat yes, so why would I want to complicate my last days with a marathon period?

Then my right lung went crazy and felt like a knife stabbing when I took deep breaths. I figured taking only shallow breaths solved that problem, but our bodies sort a like deep breaths. Go figure. A hearty dose of divine intervention, along with some mighty good pain killers, allowed my lung to calm down, but not before we cranked things up a couple notches.

Then there was my ankle issue. I knew something had to give besides my collapsing ankles, but I couldn’t stand the thought of squeezing my down-turned toes into upturned orthotics.

Consequently, when the juvenile sign-boards arrived, I lost it. For starters, I can't hold a piece of paper upright, particularly if it's floppy, or point back and forth to spell sentences one letter at a time. Yet, if I don't spell my own vocabulary words, I get to choose between those on the paper. I cannot begin to describe the overwhelming claustrophobia I feel at the prospect of truncating my entire world into 22 sign-board words. It's no one's fault. No one purposely set out to irritate, humiliate or defeat me. The sign-board floppy papers get sent to all ages of the verbally challenged, I know that intellectually. I'm not sure which 22 words I'd choose. If I were employed by the sign-board brigade, though, I'd probably lose turbaned Pineapple Man. more