I am Laura Manhardt

To many, being told they’re just like their mother comes across as a negative point. When someone tells me I am just like my mother, it is always as a compliment.

To be like my mom is to be the hardest worker in the room, a person who makes newcomers and outsiders feel welcome, and a source of joy and strength for those around her despite her life’s consistent hardships. There are few better models for what it looks like to be constantly met with disappointment, pain, and struggle, but to persevere anyhow. From childhood, she has credited me with a “roll with the punches” attitude, but I am sure I wouldn’t fit that mold had she not set an example for me of what it means to lead with a bright-side outlook and belief in oneself even when everything seems to be falling apart around you.

It is with this fortitude that she has approached her ALS diagnosis and every day since. Life has handed her a currently terminal illness, and she has met it with a fight to ensure that neither she nor anyone else has to suffer this way for any longer. Whether she’s meeting with government officials, coordinating a demonstration, or educating those she meets about ALS, she brings her resilient spirit and her determination to do everything in her power to help herself and others. She is powerful, fun, bright, beautiful, and my best friend.

It is a tragedy to think that if her efforts, and those of the ALS community, cannot save her from ALS, then I have to live the rest of my life without her true presence. But after many “you’re so like your mother” comments over the years, I know I am lucky enough to have her best qualities instilled in me. Whether she is here or somewhere beyond, I will do my best to reflect her example and always carry a bit of her strength and joy wherever I go.