Meet Your COPD Foundation Captains!

Saginaw, MI

Hello I’m Sally. I’m a retired manager/social worker. My job was working with people who had mental illness and or substance abuse issues. My work was with kids as young as 8 to a 72 year old. It was very difficult, yet rewarding at the same time. I enjoyed advocating for the rights of individuals to be treated no differently than if they had a physical condition.

One day I was working and the next I found myself on disability with breathing difficulties. It was later diagnosed as COPD. I had emphysema I was told. Even though I had smoked for years I had quit for 15. Somewhere in the back of my mind I thought I had quit in time to thwart off the consequences of smoking. But, I had not. I went from being physically active to having trouble being short of breath. This was/is my new normal!

Now I advocate for lung health and lung disease especially COPD. I try to educate people about lung disease and how it affects peoples daily life. I try to be an example of living my best life with a disease that has no cure. I have been given many opportunities to learn from others and that’s what I want to achieve with my life as an example of what to do once diagnosed.