Excerpt from the Dayton Daily News
By Tom Archdeacon
She’s her mom’s best medicine.
While Tyler Frierson, the 6-foot-4 sophomore center of the Wright State women’s basketball team, has been getting ready for the Raiders’ NCAA Tournament opener against Texas A & M, Friday in College Station Texas, her mom, Andrea, is back home in Long Beach, California, proudly following her daughter while diligently waiting on a kidney transplant list.
In the meantime, that means dialysis sessions three times a week, as well as daily insulin shots for the diabetes that initially caused the kidney failure.
“The first time she had an episode I was in middle school,” Tyler said quietly as she sat in the Setzer Pavilion following practice.
She has a special bond with her mother. She’s an only child and said her mom is “my best friend.”
“It was crazy. I remember we were at home and I went back to her room. She was lying there watching TV and I asked if she was OK. She said she was, but all of a sudden her eyes rolled back. I was like, ‘Mom!… Mom! …What’s wrong?‘
“I called 9-1-1 and then I called my aunt. She lives around the corner and she ran over. It was really scary. They took her in the ambulance and she was really, really sick.”
Over the years there have been other episodes and ambulance trips, but Tyler has learned better what to expect: “I know most of Mom’s medications now. I kind of know what to do.”
