MIDDLEBURY RESIDENT MARNIE Wood displays a photograph of her sister, Nancy Valko, who died in 2009. Valko, who was terminally ill with ALS, relocated from Middlebury to Oregon in part to take advantage of that state’s Death with Dignity law.
Independent photo/Trent Campbell
MIDDLEBURY — Nancy Valko was tired of living in the prison that Lou Gehrig’s Disease had made of her once vibrant body.
So on a sunny April 19, 2009, the former Middlebury resident took one last wheelchair ride through her favorite park, had a piece of berry pie, bade farewell to her beloved friends and family, and went out into her backyard to draw her last breath.
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