Buffalo Rising Online

Jun 16th 2008, 3:30pm By Elena Cala Buscarino

Yesterday was Father's Day, but for one young area girl, the constant will to defeat the disease that took her father this past January is part of her daily drive.

Taylor Ward has replaced her devotional at her father's bedside with a quest to bring awareness, more research and much needed dollars to the fight against Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), otherwise known as Lou Gehrig's Disease.

Sam Ward, Taylor's father was diagnosed when she was a three-year-old, and he was a single, working, young 33-year-old. Taylor grew older, wiser and more compassionate, while her father met an early demise. Immediately after his death, she met Sam's sister, her Aunt Marcie, in Washington DC, where she read a most beautiful, knowledgeable and heartfelt letter before Hillary Clinton's staff in order to raise ALS awareness and promote research. The letter will be printed in the July issue of BRM in its entirety. Prepare to be moved.

Once her father's advocate at his bedside, 14-year-old Taylor is doing all she can now toward the preservation of his memory and the effort to help to understand and staunch the disease that took the man she called her best friend.

When Sam Ward could no longer talk, Taylor spent after school and weekend hours fussing about all of the minute details of his comfort. She became his voice with caretakers and family, and now she endeavors to continue her advocacy for all ALS patients and their families through those actions she is capable of carrying out.

One such act is her participation in the annual ALS walk that will take place this August 9th. Taylor is hoping to raise funds for ALS research in the hope that other families who are facing down ALS won't have to be unpaired so long before life's dreams are fulfilled and goals are met. Surely, the most painful part of Sam Ward's disease had to be the knowledge that he wouldn't live to see this wonderful young woman he helped to create into her fully realized life. True, she's come a long way in her time, but she has set herself a path that leaves her miles to go.

Click here to pledge for Taylor's walk.

Walk information here. Maybe you'd like to sign up with Ward's Warriors and take the walk around Delaware Park yourself.