Ride For Life: Myrlee Nun, you're going to Disney World!

Copyright 2003 St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Inc. St. Louis Post-Dispatch February 3, 2003 Monday Five Star Lift Edition SECTION: NORTH POST ; Pg. 1 LENGTH: 580 words BYLINE: Denise Hollinshed Of The Post-Dispatch

Myrlee Nunn, who lives in Florissant, has Lou Gehrig's disease. She hopes to live long enough to enjoy the trip beginning March 25 with her granddaughter, Tiffany Hopkins, 9.

The big event in most grandparents' lives is the college graduation of a grandchild, a wedding or the birth of a child. For Myrlee Nunn, who is terminally ill, it's a trip to Walt Disney World with her granddaughter. Nunn, 62, who lives in Florissant, has Lou Gehrig's disease, or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, a disease that attacks the nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord.

The life expectancy for people who are found to have the disease is about 12 years, and she already has outlasted that time.

Now she hopes to live long enough to enjoy the trip beginning March 25 with her granddaughter, Tiffany Hopkins, 9. The trip is being provided by the Dream Foundation, a national group that seeks to fulfill the wishes of terminally ill adults.

"It means everything to me," said Nunn. "It will make me happy to do something for her."

Her husband, Bill Nunn, said she considered the trip the big event in her life.

"It probably is because she's got it in her mind this is going to be the last trip with her grandbaby," he said from their home. "She's really down. She's telling people that she doesn't have long to live. She told her sister that she only has three more months to live."

Bill Duke, coordinator for the Dream Foundation, said the saddest thing was when a dream recipient died before getting his or her wish.

But recently, a 37-year-old mother of two in Philadelphia arrived in Florida on Jan. 14 and left on Jan. 17 after fulfilling her dream with her children, two nieces and her husband.

"I just got a call this morning that she died last night," Duke said. "Our goal is to ensure that no adult whose life will end prematurely due to a terminal illness must ever pass from this earth without realizing one final wish from the heart.

We cannot provide a cure for our dreamers, but we can dramatically impact the quality of their fragile lives with the joy experienced from a dream come true."

He said the Dream Foundation needed donations of 100,000 frequent-flier miles for the trip because its airline-mileage accounts had been depleted.

United Airlines and Northwest Airlines have special accounts with the group to allow people to donate their frequent-flier miles. Those who want to donate miles or money may call 805-564-2131 or go to the Web site, dreamfoundation.org.

Those with flier miles from other airlines may give them if they are equal to the amount required for free tickets, typically 25,000 miles. Northwest customers can go directly through the airline at 800-327-2881.

The Dream Foundation was founded in 1994 by Thomas Rollerson, when his partner of 10 years, Timothy Scott Palmer, was diagnosed with a terminal illness.

Rollerson discovered that no agency existed to fulfill the final wishes of terminally ill adults.

The Dream Foundation grants final wishes to adults ages 18 to 65 who have a special dream they would like to fulfill before death but lack the resources to realize the dream on their own. In its eight years, the Dream Foundation has granted thousands of wishes to adults and their families nationwide.

The Foundation will give the Nunns, their granddaughter and a caretaker, Betty Jackson, five nights in Orlando with a three-day pass to Walt Disney World Parks plus passes to the Kennedy Space Center and a stipend.