Patrick Quinn ’06, the late ALS Ice Bucket Challenge co-founder and proud Iona College Gael, delivered a posthumous keynote address during Iona’s 77th annual Commencement Ceremony held virtually on May 23.
Here is Quinn’s speech, God Bless Pat. “ALS has taken so much from me, however, it will never beat me. The disease will never win because I won’t allow it. It may one day take my physical life, but my fight will last forever.
“My name is Pat Quinn, I’m born and raised in Westchester. Grew up in Yonkers, lived in White Plains for a little bit. I went to Iona Prep, went to Iona College – that’s where I played rugby and met some of the best guys in my life.
“I traveled down to Baltimore, Maryland, to visit the world-renowned Johns Hopkins Hospital. On this one day, they would run me through a million tests – most of which I had already done a number of times. After all the tests, I remember sitting in the small room by myself just waiting for the doctor to come in and tell me what he was thinking. Every Google search I did, every scientific medical opinion I ever read – it was all flying around in my head. But, what I most remember was having that last bit of hope come over me. I still had hope it wasn’t ALS and boom the door opened and my head went completely blank.
“The next thing I would hear is, “Patrick, it’s conclusive that we can diagnose you with ALS.” I remember walking out of the hospital, sitting on a bench and just staring into the sky. Even though I researched my symptoms and had a feeling it was ALS, I still had this hope inside of me that the doctors would find something different. They didn’t. Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis. On March 8, 2013, I was diagnosed with ALS at the age of 30.
“Okay, now what? I was just diagnosed with a disease that patients’ life expectancy is two to five years. I was diagnosed with a disease that no one has ever beaten.
“My disease is named after a baseball player, Lou Gehrig, who died over 75 years ago at the time and there is still no cure, even a treatment. It would have been really easy for me to give up. No one would have been mad at me if I decided to be quiet and accept what doctors were telling me was a death sentence. I want you to know that you can be great no matter what life throws your way. I want to show you goals can be achieved no matter what you are put up against. Doing something special, creating positive change, being successful, getting to where you want to be in life – none of this comes easy. Life is really difficult and I am sure many of you have gone through tough times or maybe you’re going through something right now. You need to know you can overcome these tough times, but you can’t do it alone. You need to build support. That is what I did next.
“Shortly after the shock wore off, I decided I was going to fight this thing with everything I possibly could. I needed to start somewhere so I decided to put a team together for the local ALS walk. We named our team, “Quinn for the Win.” Over 100 people would show up to support my fight. This is the first time I felt like I could really do something positive. This successful first event gave me the confidence to put myself out there and publicly fight the disease. I saw the way people responded to a young man struggling with a disease that had no hope. It inspired me to do everything I could to create that hope people needed. My belief was that creating awareness for ALS will build support and that support will lead to more funding for research. The disease that was supposed to take my strength was turning me into a pit bull. I became engulfed in ALS, putting myself out there with hopes of bringing attention to the disease. I can’t lie, I had selfish motives to start. I wanted to live. My fight started with a desire to grow old but it grew into a passion; not just a fight for myself but for everyone, and that passion would get stronger the more I got involved. Every time I met a new ALS patient, I became more inspired. My drive to fight this disease quickly became way bigger than a personal battle. This passion, this inspiration, this drive – it would all land me in the right place and right time to be a driving force behind something special, something that would make a difference and it led me to the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge.
“My message to you is that life isn’t about getting hit and hiding in a corner. Life is a challenge -it’s meant to be. The fight isn’t what I want you to think about, though, I want you to think about how you fight and what you’re going to do when the fight doesn’t go your way. You’re all going to face incredible challenges in your life; it’s about having the mental strength to see it and not be afraid. I want to light your inner fuel; I want you to know you can be a game changer. Take your life head on and be prepared to fight for everything you want in life. It’s in all of you, you just need to have the courage to let it out. This is an incredible part of your life. You’re learning about yourselves and figuring out who you want to be. See that and seize every opportunity in life. You’re not just some young college kids. The sooner you realize the time to be great is right now, the more you will accomplish along the way. You will all face difficult times but it’s up to you how you will respond when these times come around. Life will challenge you, you don’t win every battle thrown at you. There will always be ups and downs but you never give up on what you believe in. Who do you want to be? Find it and pursue it with everything you have in you. Greatness is waiting.
“When I look in the mirror every day I think, keep going and make a difference – because life is amazing.”
Thanks to Iona for remembering Pat Quinn.
