Senior Vice President – Investments
(Before ME/CFS and FMS)
After studying Business at the University of Utah,
Scott started his professional career as an accountant, working
first for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and then
for a local CPA firm. After working as an accountant for
several
years, Scott decided in 1983 to make a dramatic change and follow
his uncle, father and cousin’s lead and enter into the Securities
industry. He became an Account Executive with a large New York
Stock Exchange firm. Over many years, he developed a large
clientele of investors who also became good friends. At
the time he became ill, he was working as a Senior Vice President
with the second largest firm on Wall Street. He had also been
appointed as the Branch Office Manager of the Ogden, Utah branch and
Assistant Manager of the Salt Lake City branch. He commuted between Salt Lake City and Ogden, Utah on a
daily basis.
Scott was also active in his Church, serving in positions from teaching the very young to working with the
older members of the Church in his area. He also served in
several leadership positions within his Church and enjoyed
serving others.
All of that changed in December of 1999. Scott
became ill with what he thought was the flu. It hit its worst
point on December 31, 1999, the last day of the 20th Century, but he was still required to drive from
Salt Lake City to Ogden to work on January 1, 2000 to make sure the
office computers were working because of Y2K concerns! As
expected, the computers were functioning just fine. After
returning home, he went to bed for two weeks with a high fever,
aches, chills and all the symptoms of the flu and later double
pneumonia. Over the next months, he returned to work, only to find he didn’t
have the strength, energy and ability to think clearly as he had before. In October of 2000,
thinking he had contracted a deadly illness, he went
to his primary care physician with symptoms including severe fatigue, fever,
muscle aches, and the inability to concentrate.
His PCP ran every test he could think of before
diagnosing Scott with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, an illness that
makes one just feel like they're dying.
His primary care physician referred him to Dr. Lucinda Bateman.
In February of 2001, he decided to take a short-term leave of
absence to try to get well. The plan was to rest for 3 to 4
weeks, recover his strength and stamina and then get back to work.
Unfortunately, Scott
was never able to return to work and was forced to take
medical retirement and apply for long-term
disability. Dr. Bateman’s diagnosis was ME/CFS and Fibromyalgia.
Scott has learned the particular difficulties of dealing with this
illness as a male in today’s society.
Since becoming ill he has learned how to create and
manage web sites. Scott serves as the webmaster for
OFFERUtah.org.
He is anxiously
awaiting the day when CFS and FMS will be understood and a cure
found for all of those who suffer from these debilitating illnesses
