Drill Sergeant, Disco Queen, ALS Fighter
Friday, September 6, 2013
By: Christine Wickmark

Christine Wickmark's personal story was first published in the Evergreen Chapter eNewsletter, "Connections" August, 2013

My name is Christine Wickmark, AKA  the IDAHO Disco Queen.  I have the lower motor neuron variant of ALS known as progressive muscular atrophy (PMA).  It’s still early on in the disease, so I want to get my story out there so people know what’s going on. I have a wonderful family. My husband Dave and I have two daughters Shelby and Davianna.   I was born in St Petersburg , FL and my earliest memories include playing on the beach and selling trinkets to tourists at my grandparents store.  My father was in the USAF and was reassigned to Beal AFB, CA.  I spent the rest of my childhood in the Marysville/Yuba City area as my Dad stayed at Beale until he retired. I joined US Air Force at the tender age of 18, and loved it from the beginning. I started out in Transportation in the Protocol Section driving the Generals around at Offutt AFB, NE, Headquarters for the Strategic Air Command.  Later, I transferred from Offutt to RAF Mildenhall, UK, where I worked in Transportation and also as an instructor in Correctional Custody.  My outgoing personality was a great fit for the instructor duty and led to an invitation to be a Military Training Instructor (drill sergeant).  My last assignment was at Lackland AFB as a drill sergeant for the 3711 Basic Military Training Squadron and then finally at Officer Training School  (OTS) as a Drill and Ceremonies instructor.  I had so much fun being a drill instructor. We trained people to fight for our country. My passion is music (Disco). I was in New York City the first part of June at a Vietnam Veterans fund raiser. I got to be on stage with the best group ever, The Trammps. They let me do my disco moves while they were playing Disco Inferno (Burn Baby Burn). You can see it on youtube: When I’m not moving to the disco beat, I’m at home on our farm raising pigs. The music keeps me moving.  I will never stop moving no matter what. So how I learned about the ALS was my left thumb and first finger starting going weak. So I went to have the doctor check it out. The doctor’s first told me it was something called trigger finger. So about a year later I went back because my right arm started twitching and I was getting weak in my hands and arms.  I didn’t think much of it but my doctor sent me to a neurologist. The new Doctor got really upset and said he wanted to see me again with my husband. I went back to the doctor and he told me what I have. He said I’m one of the very few people to get diagnosed this early and one of the very few who is a woman.  I want to share my story so people will be aware of the disease and recognize the early symptoms.