Barrington Gaynor speaking to reporters after a National Premier League match in 2006. He was then the coach of Waterhouse Football Club. - file

The following is Part I of a feature on former national footballer Barrington 'Cobra' Gaynor's battle with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), a mysterious, paralysing - and incurable - disease. Part II will be published tomorrow.

There's no guarantee the muscles that allow Barrington 'Cobra' Gaynor to flash his familiar smile will work today, when he is honoured by his alma mater.

A week ago they did, along with those that made his eyes sparkle with excitement and enthusiasm, then turn to the heavens to acknowledge his faith whenever the discussion switched to his future.

The odds are stacked against Gaynor waving or giving a speech to acknowledge the crowd attending the Camperdown Classic track meet at the Stadium East. When his accomplishments as a former all-schools and national footballer are announced, his visible response is likely to be limited to movement above his shoulders.

The muscle functions that rule most of Gaynor's major physical actions are being carved away by amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), a mysterious, paralysing - and incurable - disease which first alerted the 43-year-old it was on a relentless march through his body nearly two years ago.

struggle to grasp

Those who have known Gaynor still struggle to grasp his rapid physical decline. National teammates still remember him being fit enough to run throughout an away game against Mexico, in brutal high altitude, while most of them struggled to breathe. These days he is often fixed to a chair. He can barely move or feed himself without help. The man who never feared to speak his mind now communicates mainly through fading whispers, taps on his computer's 'mouse' and depends on lip reading assistance from those who know how.

So, it can take a while to sink in when Gaynor tells a visitor he will be fine. Even harder to grasp is the admission of family and friends that he is far more concerned about their welfare than his own.

"Sometimes he asks me why I am sad," said Nyoka, his wife of five years and mother of three-year-old Juanell, one of Gaynor's two daughters. "(He says) 'I don't get mad, so why should you'?"

"At first it was very difficult, I cried every day," Gaynor's mother Vinelle said on learning her son had ALS. "But instead of worrying about himself, he was worrying about me."

Just like Lou Gehrig, whose name is forever strapped to ALS because the famous American baseball player was affected by the disease more than 70 years ago, Gaynor understands his position. Gehrig's disease affects one in every 100,000-150,000 people worldwide. Most victims are male, with the majority about age 60. Most locals know little about the disease, according to experts here, and it is not clear how many ALS victims there are in the island.

few years to live

Yet, if Gaynor believes ALS's history, he knows he may have only a few more years to live, with some of those possibly assisted by medical machines that help with tasks like breathing. But armed with faith, he is ready to buck the odds. Gaynor's mind is as sharp now as when he earned a master's degree in business. Maybe sharper. Yet, despite being confronted by overwhelming evidence that ALS is an irreversible condition, Gaynor has not budged from his resolve to fight back.

"Whenever you are down, God is up to something," reads the phrase he highlights on his laptop.

Gaynor knows why Gehrig declared, after learning he was suffering from ALS, that he was the "luckiest man on the face of the Earth" for being able to play the game he loved and enjoy the support of family, friends and fans. For 'Cobra' Gaynor, what probably hurts most is that he can no longer participate, although friends occasionally take him to games.

engrossed with football

It wasn't much of a surprise that ALS popped up while he was engrossed in football, long after his 63rd and final appearance for Jamaica in 1993. By then, his attention had switched more to coaching than playing. Family members remember the signs in March or April 2007.

"He started noticing that blowing into the whistle was getting difficult," explained his sister, Ann-Marie Gaynor-Phillips, from the United States, from where she stays in constant contact. "Swallowing was also hard for him. He started feeling stiffness in his calf."

His wife noticed, too. While the couple attended a funeral in the US, Gaynor was holding Juanell, when he suddenly handed over the baby.

"'Hold her'," Nyoka recalled him saying. "I can't hold her. My foot feels weak."

She never took his complaint seriously, linking it to fatigue from a game he had played earlier. But it got worse.

"By the summer of '07 he said 'I don't think I will be able to coach Camperdown'," she said. "I asked why and he said he couldn't blow the whistle. He said he was trying, but nothing was coming out."

Before that, Gaynor had already sensed something was seriously wrong. His sister said in July that year he once left the field because he couldn't run.

losing his balance

"He had started losing his balance," she recalled of her brother, whose agility, nimble footwork and athleticism were among the strengths of his playing career. "If he stepped back, it was as if he was going to fall ... When he wanted to cross the road and a car was coming, his legs would start cramping up."

When Gaynor's speech slurred a bit, family members thought he was suffering from a common breathing problem.

"At first, I thought it was something that could be cured, like sinus," said his 24-year-old nephew Dwayne Gaynor, one of Gaynor's strongest supporters.

Some thought he had had a stroke. When the problems persisted, he returned to Jamaica from the US to do a battery of hospital tests, inclu-ding a brain scan. No one could identify what was wrong. So in September 2007, he went to New York (NY) to do more tests. According to his sister, Gaynor visited the Department of Neurology at Westchester Medical in Valhalla, NY. The examination there was thorough, but inconclusive.

"They tested for everything," she said. "They even tested him for HIV. Also tested for Multiple Sclerosis and ALS ... I think they suspected it was Lou Gehrig's, but they weren't ready to tell him. I think they were trying to eliminate several things."