In Her Words: Doré Koontz, Learning from Love and Loss
After the sudden loss of her son to hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM), Doré Koontz launched AugustHeart to raise awareness and offer life-saving heart screenings for teens.
I grew up in Houston. I had great parents, but my parents divorced when I was eight. I was the only kid at the time with divorced parents. Even though they were divorced, they were super, super close. They were best friends. My younger sister had some issues, so they really focused on her, which meant I didn't have a ton of parental guidance. Don’t get me wrong; my parents were super sweet and great. But I would always look at other people with Norman Rockwell families and when I had my own kids I kept thinking, “I'm going to have a perfect family. I'm going to be the best mom. I’m going to stay on top of everything.” As a result, I was a super strict mom. In fact, I was over the board strict.
August was the eldest of my three children. He was really easy as a little kid. When he got older, he was still a good kid, and he was very smart, but he was hyperactive and was always getting into something. He would not study for a test and still get a 90% on it, but it was hard for him to get down the stairs and out the door for school with his homework and his backpack. He might have 15 zeros for homework. I was so focused on him making the right grades so that he could get into the college that he wanted to get into, so I was always on top of him.
When August was getting ready to graduate from San Antonio Academy (a private K-8 school for boys), we were looking at high schools. Alamo Heights has a great school district, but I was afraid he’d fall through the cracks at the public high school. We thought he needed more structure and discipline and thought boarding school would provide that, so we ended up sending him to Proctor Academy in Andover, New Hampshire. The school was super outdoorsy, and they weren't as strict as some other schools with uniforms and ties, but they did have a “three strikes and you’re out” policy for anyone who got caught with drugs, alcohol, tobacco, cheating, or anything bad.
August played football for Proctor. My ex husband, Shell, Conoly, The Hayes Family (Amy, John & Hayden), and I flew to watch August play for Proctor in the championship game. I got a call from August as we were in the car on the way there and he said, “Mom? I don't think I'm gonna get to play. We got caught with tobacco yesterday.” I remember my other son, Conoly, who was 6 years younger than August, saying, “Mommy, he would never smoke. He would never smoke." It turns out it was chewing tobacco and August did get to play, but not until the fourth quarter.
At the end of his sophomore year, August called and said, “Mom, we got caught drinking three beers. I have to go home. I'm getting kicked out.” I was very upset. It felt so unfair. Later, I would realize that God works in mysterious ways.
After he left Proctor, August participated in the Outward Bound program in Portland, Maine, for five weeks. After he got home from Maine, August went to Africa with his dad and then he went to Central Catholic High School, which is an all-boys school, and felt like a continuation of San Antonio Academy.
It was October 18, 2008, and we had just gotten a new puppy. Our youngest son had a friend stay over, my daughter had spent the night at a friend's house, and my husband was out-of-town hunting. It was about 12:30 in the afternoon and I wanted to run to the grocery store. So I went upstairs to wake up August and ask him to watch the puppy while I was gone. I remember opening the door to his room, and it was very, very cold in there. I knew something was wrong right away. August had passed away in the middle of the night. He was ice cold, but I tried to revive him. I called 911. I didn’t know what was going on. The police came and wouldn’t let me go back upstairs because they had to go investigate and see what was going on. Then my dad arrived. My husband was at our ranch and I called him, freaking out. It was just mayhem.
I'm thinking, “August did something. He drank something, or he took drugs.” But I drug tested him all the time. The word got around, and August’s friends were freaking out. They were all saying, “No, no, no. He doesn’t do drugs.” I remember saying, “Kids do not just drop dead. 18-year-olds do not drop dead. He did something.” But his friends were adamant.
It was just awful. I was a mess. What did I miss? How did this happen to him? What did I do wrong? We didn't know what had happened for months. We didn't get the autopsy report until after January.
After August died, we were getting these gigantic wreaths from Taco Taco on Hildebrand. One day, we opened the door and this little lady was there and said, “I’m Helen from Taco Taco. I'm here about August.” She said, “August came in every morning to get tacos for his friends at Central Catholic. He’d come behind the counter to help me and would say, ‘Helen, we’re going to franchise.’” She said he was there every single day during the week. When he didn't show up, she knew something had happened. She asked the kids, and the kids told her what happened. August didn't really have a sense of urgency with time. He was tardy every day, because he was stopping by Helen’s place.
That's the kind of kid he was. There are so many stories that I never knew til after August was gone. August did everything he should have done if you were only going to live here for 18 years. That has given me a lot of peace.
Months after August died, we learned that he had hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, or HCM. HCM is a very serious disease and undetected can cause sudden death with no symptoms in teens and adults. Most of the time, these heart conditions are inherited — it’s a familial trait. We had Shell and Conoly tested for HCM. That is how we knew it wasn’t inherited. There are no warning signs for sudden cardio death… none!
Kids were scared and their parents were scared. One of my dad’s best friends, Dr. Eli Whitney, a pediatric cardiologist, started screening kids for free. That’s when my husband and I thought, “We need to figure out how to get more kids tested.”
We found out there was a place in Austin called Champion Hearts that was doing screenings. My husband contacted them, and they agreed to come to San Antonio to train us. With the help of Champion Hearts and some incredible volunteers, we created AugustHeart in 2011. That first year, we had no equipment — nothing. We borrowed a couple of machines, brought in a few techs, and gathered more volunteers. The media really helped spread the word, and we tested 100 kids that first year. This year so far, we’ve screened 413 kids. Since 2011, we’ve screened more than 84,000 kids and we’ve potentially saved 408 lives.
Belle Curve Stories is about women navigating life with grit, grace and growth. What do those three words mean to you?
I think it takes a lot of grit to do the right thing or do what you feel is the right thing, even if people aren't on board with you or if you’re going against what society might think. Being your child's biggest advocate, regardless of what other people are saying takes a lot of grit. I've had a lot of friends who have gone through a lot with their kids and people are coming in saying, “You need to do this and this and this.” I say, “No, you don't. It's not their kid. You know what to do for your child.”
Grace would be forgiveness for yourself. That’s the hardest thing I've had to deal with. Also, God works in mysterious ways. I thank God that August got kicked out of Proctor, because that meant he got to come home to San Antonio. If not, he would have died up there in New Hampshire. Instead, I got to have him home for the last almost two years of his life.
Growth. I've grown a lot. One of August’s best friends’ moms, Diana, was one of the first people that came to my house after August passed. Diana and her family experienced a horrendous tragedy too. Diana’s mother, Viola Barrios, a restaurateur and philanthropist, was murdered by her 18-year-old neighbor. Diana said to me, “Dore, you're going to get through this one way or the other. But take the easy road. Forgive. Go to God. Don't get angry. Don't go down that path.” So, I immediately went to acceptance. When my mother committed suicide two years before, I wasn’t able to do that. She was a wonderful grandmother, and I just wanted her to be remembered that way. Being able to accept what happened with August more easily was growth.
What advice would you give your 25-year-old self?
Teach your children to live their best lives. Don't get caught up on how things are supposed to be. I do believe I'm a much better mom to Shell and Conoly because of the mistakes I made with August. The thing I would have told my 25-year-old self, and what I believe, with all my heart, is that we can't control what's going to happen anywhere. Anything can change on a dime. The only thing you can control is having no regrets.
Doré Koontz, 61, is the co-founder of AugustHeart, a San Antonio based nonprofit organization dedicated to preventing sudden cardiac death in area teenagers through free heart screenings. Doré and her ex-husband, Bart Koontz, established AugustHeart in May 2011 to honor their son's memory and to help prevent similar tragedies in other families. Visit AugustHeart at https://augustheart.org/
Dore's loss is unfathomable but her courage gives hope to all parents. A heartbreaking story but she found strength to continue and create change. Bless these people and their children.