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A Little respect for Kirsty

We lost our big sister Kirsty at the age of 46 on October 10th 2023 as a result of a ruptured brain AVM. She left behind her family including her husband and her beautiful 12 year old daughter. 

Kirsty was a senior analytical chemist for the Scottish agricultural science agency(SASA). On the 19th of September 2023 Kirsty had just delivered a successful presentation in work and had immediately started complaining of a headache (this wasn’t unusual Kirsty had suffered migraines all her life). Very quickly it had become apparent that this was not a normal migraine as Kirsty started to loose awareness of her surroundings and became unresponsive. We got the call from  Edinburgh Royal to inform us that Kirsty was unresponsive and had taken a substantial bleed. 

Kirsty had been diagnosed with a high grade brain AVM 4 years prior. Kirsty had suffered migraines all her life. Sometimes these migraines would last a week. Kirsty had also taken a seizure once when she was in her first year at high school but had no further episodes. The AVM hadn’t been detected at this point. Looking back now I think it’s safe to say that all these migraines and that one seizure she took were all linked to the AVM. It was only when Kirsty started hearing whooshing noises in her ear that she was referred to neurology at the Queen Elizabeth Glasgow and her AVM was detected. Drs told Kirsty that she was probably born with her AVM. They done more tests and found Kirsty’s  AVM was of a high grade to operate on and that the treatment she would receive would be conservative. They told her it was a 2% chance every year of an AVM rupturing. 

We have decided to raise funds and awareness for the butterfly AVM charity ( the first specific AVM charity in the UK). This charity is obviously very close to our hearts and we hope that raising awareness of the rare AVM condition will help sufferers and families of sufferers by helping raise money to fund research into why AVMs occur and to help discover any new genetic mutations that may predispose to the development of AVMs.  We hope that raising money will help with diagnosis and treatment of AVM. 

Kirsty was a massive music fan and was always at gigs. At her funeral we played a video of her life to the music of Erasure a little respect ( one of her favourites when we were all growing up). Included in the video were images of Kirsty and her friends participating in the Kiltwalk (Kirsty had taken part in the kilt walk for 5 years with her faithful friends helping raise thousands of pounds for the MND charity. It seemed fitting to walk for Kirsty and pay homage to Kirsty in this years 2024 kiltwalk on April 28th as this was something she was really passionate about as she liked helping others and to also invite people to pay a little respect to Kirsty as she has done for others. We hope that paying a little respect will go a long way (the stand out message of our team campaign) and help present and future sufferers of AVM.