396) PKD in the Neighborhood

February 27, 2010
Saturday

Last Wednesday: My friend Kim was listed on the board as "out" for a funeral. Now I have historically been shy of funerals... avoiding them at all costs during the years of living life on the edge. Only went to very close friends' funerals (Willie C. and Mike C.) and then my mom's... but that's about it. Then in my fifties it seemed like I was over that personal quirk and began realizing it was not about me but about MY honoring the departed and I needed to bite the bullet and go and respect the departed.

At any rate, that day Kim was out for a funeral and when I finally touched base with her later in the afternoon, she reported that he up hill neighbor had died after "years of being frail" and going for weekly "treatments" for years. At the funeral she learned from another neighbor that the woman (68) died from complications following years of PKD. Kim wondered why she hadn't gotten a transplant, like I did. I shared that there are a lot of reasons for folks not to be candidates for transplant and it would be impossible to guess what the deal was with her neighbor. Kim was surprised that right there next door was PKD, just like mine.

So, PKD is around every corner it seems, as the most common, life threatening genetic disease impacting more that 600,000 Americans.