Mark Collard:  

Since we all graduated almost 35 years ago, I'm sure we've all seen a lot of things. I don't really consider myself special from that perspective, but here is my story. After graduation, I attended CMU and graduated with a degree in Recreation Therapy. I married Laurie Wallis, who I dated all through High School and College, in 1978. We had our first child, Nathan in 1985 and our second son Derek in 1987. I worked in various Psych and Substance Abuse facilities until 1998, when I became a Youth Pastor in Sterling Heights. Laurie has taught at Mott for over 20 years now, and was at Pierce before that. We brought our kids up to love camping, and in 2004, we took a trip out west. On the way back, I got really sick and ended up in the hospital in St. Louis, MO for almost 2 weeks. After I got home, I started seeing a doc more regularly. In 2007, I almost died, and I can still hear my doc tell me, "To save your life, I have to transfer you to Henry Ford or U of M. Then Laurie and the boys came in and kind of said their good byes, which was really weird. The last thing I remember is Laurie saying to me, "Promise me you'll fight." I kind of laughed and told her I would. I didn't wake up for 2 days, and I was hooked up to all kinds of machines. It was a crazy time. I remember the surgeon coming in and saying, "You aren't healthy enough to give a liver to right now, you need to lose some weight." This was after they put fluid into me and jacked me up to 440 pounds. They put me on Dialysis, and were taking about 10 pounds off each night, but sent me home with no transplant. I tried to lose weight, ...Expand for more