His book “Jean-Marc Furlan, the gift of a life” was published these days. Cécile Traverse Furlan, wife of the former defender and coach promoted five times from Ligue 2 to Ligue 1 – a record – has decided to lift the veil on the illness from which her husband suffers. A sneaky neurodegenerative illness that gradually steals the speech and memory of its other half.
“ I realized that I would rather live uncomfortably with the truth than be uncomfortable with everything that could be said about him that was completely wrong. », blows on the airwaves of RMC this Friday the one who is now fighting the disease alongside the 68-year-old technician, former strategist of Troyes, Strasbourg, Brest or Auxerre. A coach who also passed through Libourne, Nantes and Caen where he last officiated in November 2023.
A few years earlier, while her husband was officiating on the bench of the AJA, the sports psychology speaker understood that something was wrong in the Girondin’s attitude. “ Bubbles of aggression began to express themselves. I pointed it out. But since my husband has a great temperament and he never needed to be ill to throw a tantrum, people said to me: “Cécile, if you had known him to be a player, you would understand. » It was quite unpleasant because we have lived together for 20 years. I found that the aggression was getting stronger and stronger. And above all, what changed was the relationship he had with her. »
Regular nervous breakdowns
“ My husband regularly threw tantrums when he thought his business was being insecure, he sometimes went a little too far but when he came home he was confused, embarrassed, ashamed of what he had done and the next day he was apologizingtells Cécile Traverse Furlan again.
Suddenly, in the morning, the man I loved left the house with almost the intention of throwing a tantrum at someone. It was almost a desire. There, we say to ourselves that it’s strange… »
For a long time, Jean-Marc Furlan’s wife attributed these outbursts of anger to the pressure of football. “ I told myself that he was in a period of great tension, remembers the one who witnessed the strategist’s first cognitive problems. We have a lot of trouble dating. In fact it starts with little bubbles of aggression that burst “, she confesses distraught.
