The rarity of meeting heads of state

Meeting the Prime Minister is a major highlight in my life. It is incredibly difficult to meet a head of state, some people go their entire lives without ever seeing their leaders in person. The only way I got to meet Sir John Major back in the 1990's ironically was because of my disease. Starlight foundation make wishes happen for those with terminal and life threatening illnesses. I still have no idea why I chose to see the PM, but it highlights to me how rare seeing heads of state is. You've either got to be seriously ill or in a totally different squere of influence. Pretty daunting for a young child!

Extract;
... made our way to number ten and when we arrived there was a photographer waiting. The policeman on the door helped get my wheelchair up over the step and my mother and I posed for our picture....
... Soon I was on the upper floor and my next obstacle was five small steps. About four or five burly men lifted my chair and I over the steps...
... Next I went into the cabinet room as seen on television which was dominated by a large table and many chairs. It was so exciting for a common boy from the South Wales valleys...
... I went through a large shiny black door into an office type room which was ornately decorated. There sat ...

To read more and find out what happened next in my meeting with the Prime Minister of Britain then buy my book DMD Life art and me here; http://duchennemen.net16.net/buymybook.html



Foreword

I’m Ian Griffiths from South Wales. This book is a story of my life so far up to the age of twenty five years. I live with and suffer from the ill effects of DMD which stands for Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy. It is a severe muscle wasting disease and a life limiting terminal illness. It won’t kill you in six months in the traditional sense of ‘terminal’, but it’s far crueller than that, it steals every muscle in your body first and then kills you, anywhere up to the age of thirty. There have been cases of men living past that into their forties and fifties but only with drastic interventions such as ventilators and tracheotomies, more on this can be found by reading on.
I hope to cover a few things in this book, from a history of my childhood years to a more detailed history from sixteen years onwards and finally onto my current problems and triumphs. At times things I write may make you smile or may make you pause and think about the seriousness of life with this devastating disease. I really hope there will be a cure but currently for us supposedly ‘older’ guys with DMD (over twenty one), there seems very little hope. If I don’t see a cure in my lifetime, I hope my campaigning helps in some way bring it about for future generations, so another child won’t have to see their body wither and die before their time.