I’ve always been sure that God had a plan in store for me. After the death of my wife I decided it was time to move from Tucson, Ariz. back to my home state of Alabama. It was shortly afterward that I met Tami at a bistro in Birmingham. I was smitten the moment I saw her smile and those blue eyes staring back into my own…resistance was futile! We were married not too long afterward.

Tami has a special challenge that she has been afflicted with since childbirth. Tami was diagnosed with a mild form of Congenital Cerebral Palsy (a result of brain injury during intrauterine life) and suffers with mild to moderate tremors. The United Cerebral Palsy Association estimates more than 500,000 Americans have C.P. It’s heartbreaking as her husband and caregiver, to hear practitioners tell her that she was “lucky” that she did not have the severe form of the disease. It’s as if they’re trying to ease her daily misery because they know there is no cure for it, just “management” for her condition.

As a compounding pharmacist, I know that conventional medicine does get “road-blocked” with regulatory issues and liability concerns. It’s no one’s fault that modern medicine is held hostage by the concept of litigation-based medicine and subject to pressure from health insurance providers. I remember sitting in on one of her physician visits, listening to Tami tell her doctor that she was becoming increasingly tolerant to her tremor medications and pleaded for him to change it. He only re-wrote the exact same prescriptions.

C.P. patients like Tami can now live longer lives because of better medical care; although C.P. is not a progressive disease, it still presents other medical issues that are manifested by the disease. The other unfortunate is that all research is focused on prevention and children born with C.P.

Yes, I’m thankful to God that I was not stricken with life-sentence of physical and psychological trauma she has experienced over her lifetime. I can only imagine how mean the children of her age were to her. Tami is capable of walking and doesn’t require a wheel chair. However her walk is staggered and her speech is slurred, giving the appearance that she’s been drinking excessively. In fact she keeps a doctor signed prescription that explains her physical behavior—we keep it in the cars in the advent that she might be stopped by law enforcement.

I try my best to keep her comforted when she accidentally drops something and assure her that everything is alright, or when she needs me to tie her shoes because her tremors are too great and she can’t steady her hands. I’m there for her when she needs me to drink her ice tea down low enough in the glass so that she won’t spill it on herself when she attempts to drink in a restaurant, or to cut her steak or chicken. I’m never embarrassed nor do I care what others might be thinking as I am focused only on her. I do not blame people for their reactions toward her, because they don’t know her circumstances and cannot offer their understanding. I admire Tami for her courage, her will for independence and inclusion into society.

I’m reminded every night, just before the sandman takes me, of how much I truly love this woman when she tells me to “sleep with angels,” and I reply, ”I have my angel.”

My hope is that everyone can find the love of his life—who is as beautifully imperfect in his heart as my Tami is to me.