Recovered from a debilitating illness

That's also true in a metaphoric sense. Seven years ago, when he was 12, Duggan was stricken by a crippling illness that kept him from attending school for four years. Yet, that didn't stop him from completing his work.

Tonight, Duggan will be one the 59 students honored as Excellence in Education recipients. The award recognizes Kalamazoo County's top graduating seniors based on grade-point average and test scores.

"To go through what he's gone through and get all A's - I've been doing this for 11 years, and I've ever had anything like this before," said Susan Benton, Duggan's counselor at Norrix."John-Michael is amazing. He turns everything into a positive."

In the fall of 1999, when he was in seventh grade, Duggan discovered an odd rash on his leg.

It was diagnosed as ringworm, but puzzling ailments followed over the next year, including two bouts with pneumonia and a series of strange symptoms - dizziness, body aches, fatigue.

By the winter of his eighth-grade year, Duggan could no longer attend school. Doctors at the Cleveland Clinic thought it was chronic fatigue syndrome or fibromyalgia. Doctors at The Mayo Clinic suspected multiple sclerosis.

It wasn't until June 2002 that Kalamazoo doctors realized he had Lyme disease, a bacterial illness spread by deer ticks. Relatively rare in the Midwest and often misdiagnosed, the disease can cause chronic arthritis and nervous-system abnormalities if untreated.

Duggan's vision became so bad he couldn't read, and he was so dizzy and weak that he had to use a wheelchair. After the diagnosis, it took two years of treatment and therapy for him to recover.

Too ill to go to school for eighth through 11th grades, Duggan kept up with his schoolwork with the help of Doug Barrow, a Kalamazoo Public Schools' tutor.

"He was an absolute lifesaver," Duggan's mother, Karen Duggan, said of Barrow.

Duggan was allowed to honor two "significant educators" as part of the Excellence in Education award. He named Barrow and Benton, who will accompany him to tonight's reception.

Even with tutoring, the challenges were daunting. Because of his poor vision, Duggan had to listen to books on tape and dictate book reports. He had to do math problems in his head instead of on paper. Extreme fatigue limited how much work he could do at one time.

It wasn't until the fall of 2004 that Duggan was finally healthy enough to return to school for what was supposed to be his senior year.

"I was terrified to go back," he said. "I hadn't talked to most of my friends for four years, and they'd gone on with their lives. The last time I'd gone to school was (middle school), and now I was going to this big school with all these people. I didn't know how high school worked."

He had spent four years surrounded by adults rather than teenagers. In some ways, Duggan's illness had made him more mature, but in other ways he felt stuck in eighth grade.

Fortunately, he said, "the minute I walked in the school, those fears went way."

He became a disc jockey for the school radio station and worked in the school store and the library. His old study habits kicked back in, and Duggan has worked hard to maintain his straight-A average.

Instead of graduating with his class last year, he decided to stay at Norrix for a second year to better experience high school and take classes he missed during his illness.

This spring, he's been battling kidney stones, but no matter how much pain he's been in, he hasn't missed school. "I missed four years of school," he said, shrugging. "Now, as long as I can see and I can walk, I'm coming."

Next fall, he's going to Western Michigan University to major in psychology and Spanish, with hopes of becoming a psychologist. His Lyme disease symptoms have mostly abated, although doctors predict he'll have some aches and pains for the rest of his life.

Still, Duggan and his parents see his future as bright.

"The other day I realized, I can do whatever I want," he said. "There are unlimited possibilities."

Winning an Excellence in Education award has been icing on the cake, his parents said.

"My mom always says that everything happens for a reason, and for years I didn't see it," his mother said as she dabbed at tears. "But this is the reason."