Trials & Triumphs

Originally published by the Dubois County Herald in Southern Indiana.
Story by Kate Braser; Photos by Andrew Otto
Download the complete published article: PDF (880 KB)

It’s Wednesday night and the 15 people gathered inside the small, white chapel atop a hill in Taswell are talking about how Hurricane Katrina is testing the faith of many. The one man in the group who perhaps knows best about the trials of faith sits quietly, alone in the center pew of the chapel, wearing a white-collared shirt and slacks.

Another member of the church points to him, “How many here have had their faith and patience tried as much as Keith?” the man asks, pointing to the tall man with thin, buzzed hair and glasses in the center pew. He continues, “I doubt any of us have been tried and have triumphed as much as him.”

Heads turn to where he points and nod at Keith Welp, 47, of Ferdinand. Welp’s face turns red and he laughs, shaking off the compliment and glancing down at the shag carpet on the floor. He pushes up the sleeve of his dress shirt and scratches his arm, riddled with bumps the size of gumballs, then adjusts his glasses.

A lifetime of mental frustration, social isolation and physical ravages from a debilitating disease called neurofibromatosis would push many to the brink of despair, but Welp has found a way to make peace with his illness, and has enough left in him to reach out to others to offer hope and support.

“Mine is a mild case,” says Welp of his neurofibromatosis. It’s at once ironic yet typical of Welp — always humble — to describe the disease that has wrought havoc on his mind and body and kept each of his dreams just out of reach as “a mild case.”

According to family and friends, the disease has never stood in the way of Welp’s desire for his own independence, part of which seems defined by his wish to help others.

Welp was born and raised in Jasper, the oldest of Herbert and Ida Mae Welp’s six children, but after dropping out of high school he left the area to live and work with an aunt and uncle in Florida.

A nearly 20-year search for a place to fit in led Welp back to Dubois County in the early 1990s, where he is now trying to start a support group and raise awareness about neurofibromatosis.

To understand what Welp has been up against, imagine for a moment what it would be like to draw stares from others who can't help but notice tumors that swell like marbles wedged beneath your skin, to have to work twice as hard as others to accomplish tasks, to have had classmates make fun of the way you looked and how slow you learned.

It wasn't until he was in his early 30s and had already suffered a lifetime of confusion and frustration over his condition that Welp learned the physical deformities, vision problems and learning disabilities he had actually comprise a disease with a name.

"My response was, 'So what?'" Welp said. "There's no cure, no treatment. It didn't really change anything for me except to know I had a real medical problem."

This is the life of Welp.

He lives alone in a small, one-bedroom apartment in Ferdinand. The cream-colored walls are barren. A television sits on an end table beside his desk and computer in his family room, which offers no signs of entertaining guests or making a home - no couch, no plants, no framed pictures on the wall.

Dressed in a collared shirt and slacks, Welp drives his red truck each Wednesday and Saturday to meet about 12 others at the Seventh-day Adventist Church in Taswell. When he's not at church, he visits with two friends from church - one who is helping him develop his Web business, the other with his truck repairs - and he attends a support group at Memorial Hospital in Jasper for people with depression.

The steps in his life have moved like a treadmill: No matter how strong his effort, each new attempt lands him exactly where he began, step after exhausting step.

So, for a man isolated from the possibilities of life availed to the healthy, the definition of success in life is basic: economic independence and a network of support.

To that end, he is an active member of his church, has held a position working for Southern Indiana Resource Solutions in Ferdinand for 18 months, is trying to launch his business and is starting a support group for others suffering neurofibromatosis.

"I want to get things started in Indiana for people with neurofibromatosis because I've looked and looked and not been able to find anything outside of Indianapolis," he said.

Many of his efforts to find other people suffering the disease hinge on the success of his Internet business, www.Keithsuniquegiftshop. com. If he can start making money from the site, he wants to start a Web page for people with neurofibromatosis in Indiana. He hopes such a tool can link others isolated by the disease.

Welp said he will donate 10 percent of what he makes on his site to the Children's Tumor Foundation, which provides research for neurofibromatosis. Being able to contribute to the cause seems to supersede Welp's desire to make his business succeed.

He started the business about a year ago, after seeing a commercial for the Specialty Merchandise Corp., an internet-based company with an inventory of more than 3,000 products, including coffee tables and lamps, fountains, coin purses and a myriad of home decor items.

Lured by testimonials from Web site owners who said they got rich off sales from their Specialty Merchandise Corp. sites, Welp decided he had nothing to lose by giving it a try. Welp charged to his credit card the basic package, which provides him with a site but no marketing or advertising assistance. Thus, Welp became a tiny drop in a virtual ocean of Web sites: He says more than 800 visitors have been linked to his site since he started it a year ago, but he has sold nothing yet.

"I had no illusions of making millions, I knew that wasn't realistic for me," Welp said. "I wasn't working, and I was desperate to try something that would bring me an income."

His lack of confidence as a salesman is in part to blame for the businesses' failure so far. A lifetime of struggling through school and jobs has conditioned him to be timid about approaching those beyond his innermost circle of comfort.

He meets once a week with friend Nick Johnson at Johnson's office, Harmony Design, which offers Web design, database applications and online application services. The office is set up in Johnson's father's home off a gravel road in a remote area of French Lick. Johnson is helping him promote his business and set it up.

Most of the week, he works at SIRS. The company provides outsource services for area manufacturers.

On a late August afternoon, Welp sweat as factory fans and the buzzing of saws cutting wood combined into a thunderous whir. Behind him, stacks of boards reached the ceiling, waiting their turn for his blade. Piles of sawdust scattered around his shoes. Welp picked up the boards all morning long, gripping them in gloved hands and pushing several pieces at a time through the saw blade.

He was cutting triangles that would be shipped off to make cabinets.

After he filled a black crate the size of a bathtub, Welp signaled his supervisor - a woman he said he is grateful to because she recognizes he is limited mentally or physically from doing some tasks - and she scooped up the crate with a small forklift and brought it back for Welp to fill again, careful slice by careful slice.

His are limits many don't understand, but Welp has known for a long time.

As a child, he avoided activities others enjoyed. Sports, which others who reach heights like Welp's - 6 feet, 3 inches - are normally pulled into, were off limits because he feared being embarrassed by his lack of hand-eye coordination, a common side effect of neurofibromatosis.

In elementary school, teachers whose seating charts were alphabetical always put Welp at the back of the classroom, where even his glasses - more than an inch thick - couldn't help him see the chalkboard.

Poor grades weren't the only thing standing between Welp and social ease. His physical appearance attracted ridicule too, because of the bumps all over his skin.

Frustrated, failing classes and an outcast among his peers, Welp dropped out of Jasper High School - he earned his general equivalency diploma, after three attempts, in 1988 - and moved to Miami to live with his aunt and uncle, and work at his uncle's welding shop. He stayed with them for 16 years.

While in Florida, Welp enrolled at the Florida School for Massage Therapy, and made it all the way through his classes.

Then, he learned the exam he needed to pass to get a license would not be given until six months after his classes ended.

"I studied and studied but knew I wouldn't be able to remember anything after that long of a break," he said.

He missed passing the test by just two points, paid to take it a second time, and then missed a passing score by only one point.

After that, he could no longer afford to continue taking the test, and accepted a job in the mailroom for a cruise line. From there, he took a job at Cave Springs Home and School in Tennessee, where he was charged with the care of 15 boys suffering from various birth defects and other ailments. Following that, a string of odd jobs eventually led him back to Dubois County.

His aunt, Jeanette Carter, was a second mother to Welp when he lived with her family in Florida.

A retired teacher, Carter used to spend extra time working with Welp.

While working with him on multiplication tables when Welp was in fourth grade, Carter became excited when he grasped the concept.

"I said, 'Keith you got it!' and he already knew what would happen," she said. "He laughed and told me, 'I got it tonight, but not tomorrow.' He was always good-natured about it."

Carter said it was heartbreaking to watch Welp - always sensitive to other people's feelings because of his own experiences - get made fun of by other kids.

"Kids in school would pick on him , it would really hurt him," Carter said. "We'd just tell him kids pick on anyone different, so he should just go on treating people how he would want to be treated."

While visiting family in the area for a funeral last month, Carter attended church in Taswell with Welp. Standing on the steps outside after the service, she said she often wishes Welp had been diagnosed earlier in life.

She said she was not surprised to hear her nephew was starting a support group and exploring other ways to help people with neurofibromatosis. She said Welp has always wanted to be helpful to others. No stranger to quiet suffering, Welp seems to recognize it in others long before anyone else.

"He's always been looking for other people who have (neurofibromatosis) too," she said. "I think he wants to know other people like him."

Welp put his hand on her back, helping her down the steps of the church and into the dark, grassy parking lot, illuminated only by the moon.

Watching the two walk toward Welp's truck, Johnson and his family locked the doors to the church.

"He always perseveres," Johnson said. "It's like my dad said in church, no one has been tried and triumphed as much as Keith."