His muscles are deteriorating from Lou Gehrig's Disease -- he can no longer move his hands or his head and he uses a ventilator to breathe.

She sleeps beside him, spends an hour every morning suctioning his lungs out and another hour at night using a hoist to lift him from the wheelchair to the bed.

For Flagstaff residents Bill and Marjorie Sinton, the disease (formally known as Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, or ALS) has taken away their time and freedom, but not their love.

They count themselves lucky that the disease hit late in their lives when they were prepared spiritually and financially to live their life with dignity.

Yet, the simplest tasks, from eating to going to the bathroom to reading a book, have become a labor of love Marjorie performs every day for her husband of 42 years.

Reading is something Bill, 77, misses. Their home, warm, with dark timber walls and the many clocks Marjorie, 65, loves to collect, is filled with books.

"He used to have a hat with a long stem on it, like an antennae, to turn the pages with," said Marjorie.

Marjorie laughed, remembering a trip to the Las Vegas slots.

"People would stare at him when he used that pole to press the buttons on the slot machine by bobbing his head," she said.

Out in the back yard, the train tracks Bill used to entertain the neighborhood kids with every Fourth of July are still ready to roll, surrounded by small pines and plants browned in the cold fall air. But not this year -- the ALS has gone too far.

ALS hits some people quickly. The motor neurons that provide voluntary movements and muscle power begin to die. Paralysis follows.

It started for Bill 10 years ago, when he started to fall unexpectedly. A year later, he was formally diagnosed with ALS.

He has a Ph.D. in physics and was a professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Hawaii.

Now, going to bed is a 2-hour project. So is waking up. Marjorie uses a hoist designed to slip under Bill's arms to lift him from the wheelchair. The result is similar to lifting a transmission out of a car.

The ventilator was a hard choice for the tough former scientist.

When he ended up in the hospital with a partially deflated lung, the doctors advised him to get on a breathing machine.

"They told me, 'It's going to happen again if you don't,'" he said, motioning a shrug with his sharp eyes.

He has used a ventilator the last five years. It breathes quietly on the red cart by his side.

"A lot of it is figuring out as we progress," Marjorie said. "Every stage has been a learning experience."

They paid $13,000 for a portable ventilator. In this way, Marjorie feels they were more lucky than others.

We had a money flow already built by then," she said. Medicare covers some of the costs, but the Sinton's still spend about $24,000 per year on Bill's costs.

He complains quietly of cold. Marjorie gets out of her rocking chair, rubs his hands, then covers them with a thick, soft blanket.

"Bill is still involved in ham radios. He keeps the microphone for a ham radio set at his desk, next to small dolls of baseball greats Lou Gehrig, Mark Grace and Curt Schilling, and an enormous painting of Io. It's his favorite moon because it explodes in response to Jupiter's pull rather than giving in.

He also has a tongue-operated joystick he uses for a computer mouse. The joystick also operates the on-screen keyboard, patience not included.

"Typing's hard, it might take me half-an-hour to write a paragraph," he said while he worked on his current project, a database of his contact sources.

He used a voice-actuated keyboard to write "I Choose to Live," his new book. The keyboard recently stopped understanding him as the disease progressed.

The Sintons pay for three nurses, who each work two eight-hour shifts per week. That takes some of the load off Marjorie.

"The money's going out faster than it's coming in," said Marjorie. Medicare covers most of the costs and Bill's investments and pension cover the rest, but the stress is something they deal with themselves.

"You don't go past today. If I dwell on the fact that I'm going to lose him someday, I'd be a wreck," she said. "In some ways, denial is good."

The disease stole more than their money. Their time and freedom were also sacrificed.

Some of the things they used to do together, like taking long walks and traveling, are gone now. Time to herself is something the disease took away from Marjorie.

They sometimes drive Lake Mary Road in the converted van, or up Snowbowl to watch the aspens change color.

"We've got our good memories. There's not this feeling like when you're younger that your life is being taken away," said Marjorie.