Shirt with soul

Benefit, T-shirt help Craig Oster fight for life

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Craig Oster can’t help being a clinical psychologist.

Under heavy siege from a disease that eats away at his nerves and muscles, Oster isn’t strong enough to see clients in his office anymore.

So today, he’s sitting in his Haslett apartment, looking down at his chest and analyzing his T-shirt.

The shirt, designed by artist and caricature virtuoso Dennis Preston, shows Oster lifting a huge barbell, face scrunching with effort.

“I feel like Dennis captured so much,” Oster said.

Oster’s speech is labored, but he’s patient as rock and persistent as water. With help from his girlfriend, Michelle Dengeldey, the thoughts from the probing analyst’s mind beamed from his tortured body.

“On the one hand, it looks humorous, but he really seemed to capture some of the agony of the soul,” Oster said.

“Maybe unwittingly, Dennis is tricking people into looking at something they’d rather not look at.”

The “Dr. Craig” T-shirt will be officially unveiled at a benefit concert Saturday.

Both shirt and concert will raise money to help Oster keep up his long-running fight with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS, known as Lou Gehrig’s disease.

Oster was told in 1994, at age 30, he had a disease that kills most people within five years.

Last month, he bench-pressed 110 pounds.

“I’m not sure it was a good idea,” he said with a grin. “It took me a couple of days to recover.”

Oster’s eyes radiate lifeforce. Even his bathroom is a shrine to positive energy. It’s plastered with inspirational mottos, pictures of crackling energy spheres and images of Jesus Christ, eyes aglow.

The most inspiring icon in the john is a photo of a Toyota Prius next to the toilet paper roll.

Oster hopes — no, expects — to recover his muscle and motor skills to the point where he’s the behind the wheel of a real one.

And why not? Oster was kicked out of hospice at Sparrow Hospital in 2008 when he showed no sign of shuffling off this mortal coil.

He credits a rigorous exercise program, a high-alkaline raw foods diet, and, most of all, a positive mindset.

“That’s where it’s at,” he said.

Typing painfully with one finger, Craig set up a website where he shares morale-building ideas with other ALS sufferers.

This summer, he has hooked up with two other researchers with the goal of writing formal papers on role of psychology in disease.

Oster admits it’s a controversial topic. Many people, he said, think it’s “cruel” to link psychology and healing.

“They fear people will blame themselves for not getting better,” he said.

He was quick to add that psychology is one factor among many.

“There’s genetics, and environmental toxins,” he said. “All these things play a role. But right now, for my own case study, I believe they all interact with psychological factors.”

His professorial discourse came between swigs from a water bottle Dingeldey brought to Oster’s mouth.

“You’re not going to write about my drinking problem, are you?” he cracked.

His eyes watered with emotion when he talked about friends like the musicians who will play at Saturday’s benefit and Preston, who donated his talent to design the shirt.

“I hope he sells a lot of them,” Preston said. “He’s a fighter. It’s one of those things you see movies made about. You want to see this guy win.”

On the shirt, Oster wears his trademark wool cap.

“No one really knows the reason behind it,” Oster said, with the twinkle in his eye of a man who is about to give a newspaper an exclusive.

Three times a week, Oster powers through agonizing workouts at the Sparrow rehab gym. When he goes to the bathroom, his trainer, Mike Akin, holds him steady at the urinal.

When Akin lifts Oster in and out of his wheelchair, he momentarily steadies Oster’s forehead against the wall. The hat protects Oster’s head, but it’s also become the sartorial trademark of “Dr. Craig.”

Preston wanted it on the shirt.

“I thought it was cool,” Preston said.

“It reminded me of Rocky, running up the steps.”



2010 Craig Oster Music Extravaganza Fundraiser

featuring Root Doctor, Virginia Lyric’lee Anderson, Matt Bliton’s, everlovingmind, Jimmy G and the Capitols, and the Scorching Hot Blues Band. 3:30-10 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 23. Perspective2 Studios, 319 Grand River Ave., Lansing. (517) 482-5700

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