Dialysis patient skydives to show ability

Dialysis patient skydives to show ability

By TOM HOWELL JR.
thowell@njherald.com
Created: 8/9/2008

WANTAGE — Township resident Arnie Vandermark turned to his nephew on Friday and asked him if he brought a change of underwear to his first-ever skydive.
“No, I live close enough to here,” quipped Charles Babcock, 22, whose house on County Route 628 is within sight of the Sussex Airport.
Babcock had watched parachuters drop from the clouds near his home for years, but now it was his turn.
It takes fortitude to ascend 10,000 feet in a tiny Cessna airplane and return to Earth the quick way, but Babcock knows a thing or two about courage.
At age 8, Babcock went to the hospital for pneumonia and learned that 75 percent of his kidneys had shut down. Diagnosed with polycystic kidney disease, Babcock still goes to dialysis three days a week.
He received a kidney from his mother, but his body rejected it seven years later. A cousin, Chris Padgett, donated a kidney in 2004, which lasted about a year.
In September 2006, Babcock went into an induced coma for two weeks because of a multitude of infections. He almost died.
So on Friday, Babcock waited with Zen-like calm as a line of other customers at Sussex Skydive jumped from the sky, posed for photos and went on their way.
“I’m nervous, he’s not,” Charles’ mother, Linda Babcock, said. “He’s wanted to do this for a very long time.”
Her son chose the date of the jump, 8/8/08, as a “lucky” day and because the date would be easy to remember.
Urged on by his loyal physician, Dr. Jose Salcedo, of St. Joseph’s Hospital in Paterson, Charles Babcock wanted to send a message.
“He wants me to show other people with disabilities that it’s OK to do things,” Babcock said.
A fan club of relatives — including three aunts, Dorothy Shauger, of Hardyston, Susan Mericle, of Wantage and Mary-ellen Meeks, of Milford, Pa. — waited nervously before Babcock suited up for the jump.
“Doing this daily for the general public is such a gift for us,” said Debbie Franzese, an instructor who jumped out of the same plane as Babcock. “But to do this for someone who has been through so much is beyond rewarding.”
Babcock’s tandem jump partner, Simeon Lott, explained how to pull the ripcord, how they’ll be attached to each other and the proper form as they step out of the plane.
“Sometimes the screaming is involuntary,” Lott said.
Crammed in a small plane with a red-and-white checkered tail, Babcock began his ascent as his loved ones tracked the shiny dot in the sky that became ever smaller.
“Nothing better than taking the time out to smell the roses,” Meeks said, peering at the plane as it ducked in and out of clouds, “even if it’s from 10,000 feet.”
As he appeared in free fall, Babcock’s relatives engaged in a string of “woohoos” and fist pumps.
It looked like quite the thrill, but it also was a release from all Babcock had dealt with: Three-and-a-half hours of dialysis at 6 a.m. on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays, wearing tubes that come out of his chest that are used to cleanse his body systems, and waiting for a kidney match with an AB-positive blood type — not to mention consistent dizziness on dialysis days.
“I didn’t see myself as different than anyone else,” he said about his childhood. “I just happened to have kidney disease.”
After a graceful float above the airport grass, Babcock and Lott slid to the ground surrounded by relatives and skydive instructors.
“It was awesome,” Babcock said, hugging everyone and shaking hands. “It looked like flying in a jet, except the ground was getting closer.”
A High Point Regional High School graduate, Babcock plans on attending culinary school in the near future. But he will “definitely” make time to go skydiving again.
And to his family, it’s a distraction that he deserves.

http://www.njherald.com/story/news/Dialysis