meaning of maternal inheritance

June 3, 2005

Dolores

Just a note regarding your comment below, about great-grandaughters. I'm

assuming you're referring to " maternal inheritance " . My understanding of the

term is that, where it applies, it means that one can only inherit something

from one's mother. In other words, I as a male cannot " give " it to my

children, and furthermore my father could not have " given " it to me. But

this term does NOT mean that only females can inherit the disease. Males can

get it (from their mothers) but then cannot pass it on to their children.

So that means that your great-grandaughters AND your great-grandsons could

get a maternally-inherited disease " from " you. However, it also means that

this would only be the case if those great-grandchildren are children of

your grand-DAUGHTER, who in turn is the child of your DAUGHTER.

Hope I have that right. :-) Also, perhaps I've mis-assumed, and you simply

made that reference because you don't have any great-grandsons. In which

case, never mind. :-) It's also true (to my understanding) that maternal

inheritance does not apply to all mito diseases.

Anyway, my blessings for the best possible health for you, your children,

your grandchildren, and your great-grandchildren, and so on forever.

Steve D.

> Date: Tue, 31 May 2005 18:02:05 -0700 (PDT)

>

> Subject: Re: diagnosis

>

> [...] I just try to keep plugging away and pray that my precious

Great-grandaughters will not have this problem handed down

> to them. Everytime I see the four month old roll her toes under it

scares me to death as that was one of the things I used to do for muscle

spasms a good lot of my life until they got so bad I would jump out of bed

screaming. I know this really isn't giving answers but I hope in some way

it will help. Dolores

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