Photo by THE ASSOCIATED PRESS. In this Dec. 17 image, Matthew Kremis, center, poses for a picture with his brother Trevin and their mother, Deanna ,in their home in San Marcos, Calif. All three have received heart transplants, after suffering with an inherited heart condition.
SAN MARCOS, Calif. – Deanna Kremis remembers the exhilarating day her young sons first had the energy to race each other up a flight of stairs.
The brothers, then ages 7 and 10, could barely walk before having heart transplants just a month apart. As they flew up the steps two at a time, jostling and shouting, she recalled, “My friend turned to me and said, ‘Are you ready to get one now?’ ”
It was a joke that became prophesy. Her health, too, was slipping away because of the same inherited cardiac condition. By the time she received her own transplant in July, her heart was so weak, she fainted while walking down the hall, collapsed midsentence and passed out in the middle of dinner at a friend’s house.
Her decline was terrifying for her sons, who were just beginning to embrace their lives with donor hearts and now saw their worst memories reflected in their mother’s struggle. All three have hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, a genetic condition that causes the heart muscle to thicken until it can’t pump properly. Kremis’ mother and brother also have it, as did her grandmother.
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