For Vicki Clark and her 13 siblings, along with members of their families, Sunday's Walk to End Alzheimer's was a bittersweet gathering.
Outwardly, socializing, smiles and laughter dominated. But this family of 14 children was also deeply troubled: They're on the verge of losing their mother to the very disease they were walking to fight.
"Today may be the day she goes to see the good Lord," Clark said before the walk started.
Their 50-plus member team, Farris Wheels of Hope, had raised $10,000 in its 3rd year of walking, which was half of the entire amount raised by the Alzheimer's Association fundraiser as of Sunday.
The team held a rummage sale, bake sale, quilt raffle, trivia night, family cookbook sale, and a mutton BBQ, plus silent auctions at two of those events.
"They're our stars. They're amazing," Megan Schwedtmann said of the team. She is the special events coordinator for the Alzheimer's Association Greater Missouri Chapter, which is based in Columbia and covers 58 counties.
She said organizers are confident that after all the donations have come in, they'll have topped their $30,000 goal.
The money goes to research and the care and support services provided by the organization. That includes care consultations, respite care and educational programming.
Alzheimer's is the sixth leading cause of death, and more than 500,000 people die from the disease each year. But Schwedtmann said strides have been made in recent years, including PET scans that can definitively diagnose the disease. Previously, doctors could only diagnose it based on symptoms, but this brain scan can diagnose it by revealing amyloid plaques in the brain.
Clark said her 79-year-old mother, Regina Farris, would be otherwise healthy if not for Alzheimer's, which she described as a "horrible thing."
"You hear about it, but you don't really know about it until you have someone you love" is afflicted. "That's when it hits home."
She said family members noticed symptoms as far back as eight years ago.
They put their mother in a nursing home last year for a week until deciding to take care of her at home.
"We're a very close-knit family. She was there for us, and we're there for her," she said.
In the last year, Farris' health has declined, and that has accelerated in the past month.
She said her mother can seem to recognize faces, but can't recall names. "Two to three words - that's a sentence for her. There's no communication at all."
Clark said their family's goal in creating a team for the event is to find a cure.
"It's just a hard thing for people to go through," she said. "I hate that we have go to through this, and I would hate for others to go through this."
Sunday's event featured 24 teams and 139 walkers.