“Just like ‘The Dink,’ pickleball was the best medicine for my husband.”
In this moving column, Christine Ledbetter connects the Apple TV movie The Dink with her husband Dean’s real-life experience. After being diagnosed with cancer, the lifelong tennis player joined a pickleball club, where he found a way to keep playing despite his declining health - and discovered a deeply supportive community.
As Dean’s illness progressed, his pickleball friends became family. They joined a fundraising walk, visited him in the hospital, brought meals, created an encouraging video before surgery and organized a tournament in his honor. Their friendship, compassion and laughter carried him through the most difficult chapter of his life.
His story is a powerful reminder that pickleball offers much more than exercise - it creates connection, belonging and support when they are needed most.
Summary of a column originally published in The Roanoke Times.
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