Someone in our support group was able to contact Greatcod's brother. She reports that his brother sounded very caring and nice. Greatcod's name was Harold Roy.
Last Wednesday the police were called to his apartment and found Harold dead. As in all unattended deaths, his body was sent to Boston for an autopsy, and the results are not yet back and no arrangements have been made.
I thought it would be nice if each of you who appreciated Harold's wit and his Greatcod posts would share your thoughts here. His brother would probably appreciate seeing some of his posts as well.
I will print this out and send it to him. Or if you would prefer, you can send a card to him. Cameron Roy 17 Hamilton Rd. Cranston, RI 02910
His brother also expressed the wish to come to Cape Cod and share in a service for him. We are pleased about that.
Many thanks. I do not know how to put this on the Lyme Memorial Page, but perhaps one of you will.
[ 24. July 2008, 06:31 PM: Message edited by: nan ]
Posted by Meg (Member # 22) on :
Harold/GreatCod, we're going to miss your witty posts!
For anyone who wants to read what he wrote in his 3 years here, his member # was 7002. Not only did he post here on LN, but on other boards with the GreatCod name also.
I'll be praying for comfort for his family and friends......
Posted by sixgoofykids (Member # 11141) on :
If I were to have a final post here, I would want it to be as witty as his final post -- on the thread "Why do only nice people get Lyme" -- I have Lyme and I'm not very nice!
It still makes me smile.
Thank you for the update. My condolences to the family.
Please keep us posted on the cause of death.
Posted by Tracy9 (Member # 7521) on :
World of wonder in Lyme bacterium
By HAROLD ROY
I don't know much about God or science, but find myself fascinated by the current debate between intelligent design advocates and evolutionists which is going on largely in Bible belt states.
The ID folks argue that some intervening intelligent being creates life in its multiplicity of forms. The evolutionists see a random and incessant process of slow changes producing the most robust life forms, for that time and place, anyway.
I personally believe that evolution is God's way of getting the results he wants, and that he has a lot of fun doing it. But I don't know for sure, and don't expect to.
Each of us is awesome-a universe of billions of cells, awash in oceans of bio-chemicals. One celled bacteria were quite different, dull, or so I thought.
I was raking leaves at a home near Lake Wequaquet on a Saturday in April 1986. On Monday, I felt very weak, and was at a doctor's by Thursday. I had three reddish oval rashes on my chest, but back then, physicians were looking for the now ''classic'' bulls eye rashes, so my Lyme Disease went undiagnosed.
I recovered some on my own, without treatment, but had numerous relapses over the next months.
A year after the tick bite, I could barely get out of bed. For the next eight years, I was diagnosed, wrongly, with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.
In 1995, my Lyme was detected by an astute physician to whom I went to for another problem. In the next years I received substantial oral anti-biotic treatment. It lifted me out of the zombie category, but I never will be genuinely healthy.
All the symptoms continue, less severe, and so does the characteristic cycling. Now, depending on who I ask, I have Chronic Lyme Disease with continuing infection and an up-regulated immune system, or Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, cause unknown , or Fibromyalga Syndrome, cause unknown, or Post Lyme Syndrome, with an auto-immune etiology.
I became curious about why medicine has so many different views of the same set of symptoms.
The dispute is over whether the causative agent of Lyme, the spirochete bacterium Borrellia Burgdorferi (Bb), eludes both the immune system and significant courses of antibiotic treatment, as some say, or if the host individual experiences some sort of post-infectious syndrome. The debate is heated, to say the least. Other spirochetes cause syphilis and Relapsing Fever.
These Bb little guys are only 20 microns, 20 millionths of a meter long. They move with the aid of flagella, like little worms with several sets of legs.
They sequester in numerous tissues, preferring neural tissue. Bb's locomotive capacities allow it to move from through the skin and into the blood stream, then into other parts of the body including the brain.
Antigenic variation is another tactic of Bb survival, and is a very interesting phenomenon. Bacteria have Outer Surface Proteins (OSPs), or antigens, to which the humoral immune system develops antibodies which then attack and destroy the bacterium.
Antigenic variation gives the bacterium the capacity to up-regulate (increase the number) or down regulate specific OSPs, presenting a complex and varying pattern to the immune system. A set of antibodies sufficient to control the bacteria's spread at one point becomes inadequate later.
Other cards up Bb's sleeve are that, in the host, it can exist in alternate forms, against which antibiotics are ineffective. It has a cyst form, an egg- like mode from which the full bacterium can later emerge.
Another variation is a cell wall deficient form, which protected it from antibiotics which attack cell walls. Bb also exchanges DNA with others of its kind. This is the mechanism which produces bacterial antibiotic resistance, which has become a very serious medical problem.
Bacteria have been shown to communicate bio-chemically with each other. Bb may be one of those with this capacity, and there is evidence that it produces neurotoxins.
So, our agile little friend is quite gifted, a wondrous thing really, not merely a brainless one cell simpleton.
It uses it complex strategies to survive and reproduce, as do we all. As with the AIDs virus, it is small but not fragile, and is no easy foe. It seems quite plausible that it may be extremely hard to eradicate.
It was Blake who asked that we see a world in a grain of sand. I have come to understand that there is a stunning beauty to Bb and other bacteria.
Even the smallest living things, including those which may harm or kill us as they live out their lives, are gloriously endowed.
Whether life is designed or evolves, or both, it displays a complexity and magnificence to its many forms that speaks of more than we can ever know.
Harold Roy lives in Harwich.
Posted by Melanie Reber (Member # 3707) on :
Hi Nan,
I added Harold to the Memorial yesterday when I read of his passing. Thank you for the family information and for the additional news.
I am so terribly sorry for all who knew and loved him.
Melanie
Posted by bettyg (Member # 6147) on :
tracy,
thank you for posting harold's post above; well done and thought-provoking! Posted by Melodymaker (Member # 16434) on :
There is a special sadness that comes from learning about the passing of a wonderful person that I never had the chance to know.
GreatCod was clearly one of those people. =) Thanks for sharing his legacy.
Posted by lou (Member # 81) on :
Nan, is there really a town called Ctanston? This looks like a typo maybe.
Posted by nan (Member # 63) on :
Thanks, lou! My lymebrain! Posted by Tracy9 (Member # 7521) on :
Cranston
Posted by cbb (Member # 788) on :
Sending condolences to his family and friends. He will truly be missed!!
Posted by Tick Tock (Member # 15948) on :
I live about a mile from Harold's brother in Cranston.
Is there anyway I can help? I don't know how but am willing if my proximity helps.
Many Rhode Islanders do not place obituaries in the Providence Journal as it is cost prohibitive. A small obit costs about $1000.
Posted by bettyg (Member # 6147) on :
tick tock,
$1,000 is OUTRAGEOUS for a small obit!!!! *****************************************
wow, that's nice you live so close by his brother! Posted by AZURE WISH (Member # 804) on :
So sad to hear of this. My condolences to his family and friends. Posted by Tick Tock (Member # 15948) on :
BettyG,
We just paid $950 for my mother-in-laws obit and I was outraged too.
A single column, only 5 inches long for a single day in the statewide Providence Journal.
Posted by kelmo (Member # 8797) on :
It costs a lot of money to die. $1000!!!? I had no idea they were ripping off people that much.
Posted by aklnwlf (Member # 5960) on :
I remember reading some of his posts. Thanks Tracy9 for including one of his posts in this topic. The fact that he was quoting Blake's Auguries of Innocence makes me miss him even more and wonder about what kind of person he was.
My condolences to his family.
Posted by Lymetoo (Member # 743) on :
My condolences to Harold's family. He will be greatly missed around here!!!
I've had the pleasure of being here on Lymenet with Greatcod for many years. We didn't always agree, but he was never disagreeable! And his wit will be remembered by us all!!
I LOVED his essay (above) .. it is nicely put and I'd never read it before. Thanks for posting it!!
As for obits, it's the same way in Houston. Not quite as high, maybe.. but $700+ for a small obit...
I'm old school. I remember when ALL obits were FREE.. as they SHOULD be! Posted by bettyg (Member # 6147) on :
the obit range is just awful!
thanks ticktock and tutu for your input on what was paid in yoru areas.
it's been 7 years since our last family member passed, and i know our FREE ones were changed to show only name, and time/date of funeral ONLY!
they get you coming and going!
tutu, my sympathies to you on your sister-in-law's recent death also! xox
Posted by sunshinyday (Member # 14337) on :
My sincere condolences to his family.
There is deep sadness for the loss of a fellow soldier in this war.
His humor and wit will be missed here.
Gail
Posted by lymielauren28 (Member # 13742) on :
My heart and prayers are with his family. His quick wit and honesty will be greatly missed.
Lauren
Posted by jjeennnniiee (Member # 7964) on :
In all honesty, I didn't know him very well, at all, but I do remember reading some of his posts here.
Antyime I hear about the passing away of anyone anywhere from lyme disease, it always deeply saddens me, regardless of if I knew them well or not.
I can tell alot about him just by what those of you all here who knew him well have said about him here though, including his great wit and humor, including his one-liners.
I gather from that he was very well liked, fought hard to try to regain his health, and contributed meaningful information here too, which tells me he was a wonderful person I regret not knowing better.
May God comfort each and everyone of his friends and family members, who will miss him very much and with good reason, all of which I extend my sincerest heartfelt sympathy.
May Harold Roy finally be able to rest in peace and experience a new life filled without the pain and suffering he once endured from having lyme disease now.
Love, Light, & Health, Jennie
Posted by Robin123 (Member # 9197) on :
I miss his presence here and I never met him. I appreciated his responses to me and everyone else on the board.
Posted by Tick Tock (Member # 15948) on :
Last week I was in my LLMD's (Dr. D.) office in Massachusetts and was reading the Cape Cod Voice and happened to open it to an article about Harold Roy, including a photo.
The article was called "Chronic Lyme: Fact or Fiction", by Doreen Leggett. June 2008 issue.
I did not know Harold (Great Cod) and only heard of him through LymeNet and the wonderful posts I've read.
I read the Cape Cod Voice article with such interest and studied the photo as if I knew this man.
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