A Family Tradition
— Carlos Briceño

Some families celebrate holidays and birthdays with cake and candles. Ours? We celebrate being alive with crowns, banners, and a little medieval pageantry. If you’ve read my earlier columns, you know my wife Jill’s “live like you’re a tourist” motto is more than just a saying; it’s the compass…

My wife, Jill, and I are what you might call the walking wounded these days. My elbow had been swollen and sore for weeks due to bursitis, although I kept telling myself it would get better. It didn’t, until I went to the doctor and got some anti-inflammatory medicine. Jill’s…

A couple months ago, my wife, Jill, and I were delighted to attend the wedding of one of our daughter’s closest college friends. Over the years, our daughter, Alexus — or Lexi, as we call her — has introduced us to some of the remarkable friends she made at the…

Some days, I view my life like a split screen. On one side is life before Huntington’s disease entered it. On the other is everything that’s come after. Although our lives changed the day my wife, Jill, was diagnosed with Huntington’s in 2018, she hasn’t. Every now…

My wife, Jill, and I recently helped our daughter, Alexus, and her husband move. One night, we had dinner together, along with some of her friends, and it began with the usual polite choreography: exchanging names, shaking hands, and engaging in small talk. By dessert, though, it felt like we’d known each other…

As we celebrate National Family Caregivers Month, I would like to share an experience I had at a Huntington’s disease advocacy meeting I attended with my wife, Jill, a couple of years ago. It was my first advocacy meeting, and as I stepped through the doors of the…

“You pay for it now, or you pay much more later.” My wife’s father said that often. Ken wasn’t a policymaker or a scientist. He was a dad who lived and died with Huntington’s disease, passing in 2011 from complications of the same illness that now tightens its…

Second in a series. Read part one. Last week, I introduced Christy Dearien, the author of “Livable Lives: Conversations with the Huntington’s Disease Community.” The book explores how Huntington’s disease (HD) affects relationships, identity, and life decisions. My wife and daughter, as well as Christy’s…

First in a series. My wife, Jill, and I met Christy Dearien last year at a Huntington’s disease (HD) event in Maryland. Like Jill, Dearien’s brother is gene-positive for HD. Dearien had just published a book, “Livable Lives: Conversations with the Huntington’s Disease Community,” exploring how this…

I got home from work the other day and caught a glimpse of a relic on our television set: a 5 p.m. local newscast. Stranger still, my wife, Jill, was actually leaning forward and watching it. On the newscast, some government officials were criticizing diversity, equity, and inclusion, or DEI,…

Huntington’s disease (HD) has cast a long shadow over my wife Jill’s family tree. When she was diagnosed in 2018, we knew we’d be fighting the same enemy that had taken her father and many other relatives on his side of the family. Today, we focus on what gives…