Folsom man with Galt ties battles ALS
When Greg Houck, a Folsom resident with ties to Galt, found out that he had ALS back in June, the news sent Houck and his family into a state of disbelief.
“It was pretty shocking,” Houck’s daughter Michelle said. “He kind of had some health stuff going on and I knew they were looking into it but I honestly just thought it’s nothing. So when we found out I was pretty devastated. I was not prepared.”
After being diagnosed with ALS — Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease — Houck and his daughter are determined to find a cure for the disease.
The two plan to participate in the ALS Walk set for Saturday at Raley Field in Sacramento at 11 a.m. Funds raised during the event will go towards ALS research.
Houck’s battle with ALS, a nervous system disease that weakens muscles and impacts physical function, started last fall when he was having trouble swallowing his food.
His doctor advised him to cut his food into smaller bites and drink more liquids to see if that would help. When Houck visited a neurologist due to a damaged vertebrae in his neck, he asked the doctor to change his medication because he thought it was distorting his speech.
However, the doctor informed Houck that he wasn’t taking enough of the medication to affect his speech.
The new discovery prompted the doctor to run a series of tests to determine why Houck was struggling with his speech. By the end of May, doctors were still unable to narrow down a diagnosis for Houck. He was sent to UC Davis Medical Center where it was determined that he had ALS.
Houck said the doctors didn’t need to run tests — his symptoms pointed to ALS.
“It was a bit of a shock because I thought I was going down there for some testing, and I walked through the door, sat down and then the three ladies came in from the ALS Society with all this paperwork,” Houck said. “So they basically told me, not even a doctor.”
While it was shocking news, Houck said he knew that it could have been one of the reasons for his symptoms.
“I’ve beaten other stuff before, so I guess this is my newest challenge,” Houck said of his outlook following the news.
According to Michelle, her mother was the one that kept everything together and made coping so much easier following her father’s diagnosis.
“My mother is a very action-oriented type of person so that’s helpful because she already had a whole set of plans set out and I think that really helped,” she said. “That was kind of comforting.”
Support from friends also helped her to cope with her father’s diagnosis.
While Houck has had to make adjustments, he says the diagnosis hasn’t yet necessitated any drastic lifestyle changes.
“I have to set aside time for doctor visits and the infusions that I do every 14 days,” he said. “You have to adjust your schedule. One of the biggest things is you just have to set aside more time when you eat because you have to do it slowly so that you don’t choke. Planning for the future is also difficult because at some point I will be in a wheelchair. I will lose the use of my arms and legs and the rest is downhill from there, so there is a lot of planning.”
With ALS it’s difficult to determine a prognosis because every case is different, Houck said.
Since his diagnosis his visits to the doctor have increased as medical staff continue to monitor his progress. Despite everything, he still has a positive outlook on the future and said he is not afraid.
“There’s no real option. You can’t feel sorry for yourself, you have to take what you’ve been dealt with and do the best you can,” he said.
He’s battling the disease with the help of family and friends who will be joining him at the walk on Saturday
“The event is a really good event because it allows people that care about people that have been diagnosed with ALS to get out and show their support,” he said. Michelle agreed. “It’s such as nice feeling to have all those people kind of step up and want to support everyone and be together and have a positive result of something that’s so negative,” she said. “It’s nice to have an event where everyone is pulling together and plus we’re raising money to help find a cure which is the dream.”
In addition to participating in the walk, Houck will take part in an ALS study in which samples will be taken from him and submitted into a pool of samples from 600 people nationwide in an effort to look at the role genetics might play in causing the disease.