Hereditary Diseases

There is a diagnosis that works differently from any other. Not "you have acquired something" — but: "you have brought something with you." A hereditary disease changes one's relationship to one's own body in an instant. Suddenly you are carrying not only your own life, but the genetic signature of those who came before you. Your mother. Your father. The grandparents you may never have known. A line that passes through you — and that you did not choose.

The first feeling is often: powerlessness. How do you change something written into every cell? How do you take responsibility for something determined long before your own birth? Medicine has a clear answer to this: You are not to blame. Genes are genes. Some things can be treated, others only accompanied. That is true — and it is an important truth. It lifts the burden of moral guilt from your shoulders.