On September 7, 2012, my Mother passed away.  She was just 61 years old.

It was only after she'd collapsed and fallen into a coma that we learned that she had an undiagnosed heart condition called hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM).    HCM is an excessive thickening of the heart muscles that, if left untreated, can result in sudden death.  The cause can be your genetics, but it can result from other factors such as high blood pressure that is left untreated.  This is what happened to my Mom.       

Incidents such as this are not isolated, nor are they relegated to older or out-of-shape Americans.  We have all heard or read stories of young athletes collapsing and dying on the basketball court or the football field.  For far too many, the first symptom of a problem is a full on blackout or sudden death.  Heart disease remains the number one killer in the United States.

It doesn’t have to be this way.  Had my mother treated her high blood pressure, her doctors said that she could have lived for several more years without a problem, albeit with medication. 

My personal experience has made me a strong advocate of the American Heart Association (AHA).  Their primary missions include not only essential funding of research for cures and medical advances, but also, just as importantly, educating the public on the (often, simple) things we all can do to avoid the fate of too many in this country.         

Fundraising events like the Red Ball go a long way toward helping the AHA achieve its goals.  Whether you come to the event, donate, or both, your contribution will have a very real and direct impact on the AHA's effort to make my Mother's story, and the story of others like her, a very rare occurrence indeed.

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