‘I still have hope’ – Football hero remains positive two years on from shattering motor neurone disease diagnosis
MARCUS STEWART feels like a fraud, even though he is anything but that.
The Ipswich icon lives with motor neurone disease but can still drive and walk to the pub while the condition’s horrible effects are yet to fully take hold.
It is more than two years since the diagnosis and Stewart’s right arm is starting to show the symptoms that first affected his left hand.
Yet the 52-year-old former striker confessed: “I feel a bit of a fraud sometimes.
“I’m fine. I’m in pretty good nick considering a lot of other people with MND. I can still have a pint, I can still walk, I can still drive.
“Life as it stands hasn’t changed that much. You see other people with MND in their wheelchair and they can’t speak, so hopefully that doesn’t come to me soon.
“If there’s no cure or treatment, then it will do but I still have hope. I always live in hope.”
Despite his outward persona, Stewart — who also starred for Huddersfield, Sunderland and both Bristol clubs during a 20-year career that saw him score 222 goals — admits frustration at no longer being able to easily do things he once did.
He no longer has use for his bike and golf clubs. But he hopes to be around when a treatment for MND is found, ideally before he has to sell his car.
Stewart added: “My wife will tell you I get angry when I can’t do something like take my socks off or put them on or open a jar or a can of beans, I can’t do that.
“I don’t like asking someone. I’ve always been quite independent, so that frustrates me a lot.
“I’ve just got to adapt. I love playing golf, I love running, keeping fit. I can’t really do that any more, that frustrates me.
“Every symptom I get, I seem to have to sell something as I can’t use a certain part of my body.
“I’ve sold my bike and my golf clubs but I haven’t had to sell my car yet.
“I know the day I’ll have to will happen, it’s just happening a bit slower for me.
“And I’m hopeful something will happen before that comes. It’s unlikely but I still have hope.
“I think I’ve got a little bit of time on my hands for there to be some sort of cure or treatment. Hopefully in my time, that might happen.”
Stewart was at the finish line for Kevin Sinfield’s incredible 230-mile running challenge in the Saddleworth area of Greater Manchester earlier this month.
Sinfield was a close pal of Rob Burrow, the Super League icon who passed away in June following his battle with the condition, and has raised more than £1million for MND charities.
Stewart said: “He’s a juggernaut, isn’t he? He’s just a great guy who genuinely cares about people. In normal life, I think that’s Kev.
“But he’s taken it upon himself to care for us really. It started with his mate Rob and he’s giving hope to the other 5,000 people in the country who have MND.
“And the biggest thing he’s given through all this is hope. That’s what he does, along with the awareness and fund- raising that goes a long way, hope comes hand in hand with that.
“If there’s money going to the scientists, to fundraising, to helping people, there’s got to be hope.”