Readers Care: AIDS support group, family develop close ties

EDITOR'S NOTE: For a quarter-century, Seattle Post- Intelligencer readers have donated generously to the newspaper's annual Readers Care Fund drive, generating more than $5 million for local charities. Today, we look at one of the charities benefiting this year: Rise n' Shine.

GRANITE FALLS -- It started in January 1981 with crunching metal and shattering glass and a wound deep enough to cut across generations.

Nancy Thompson was 22 when a drunken driver broadsided her vehicle, breaking nearly every bone in her body and requiring an infusion of 24 units of blood.

With that lifesaving infusion, an undetected harbinger of death slipped into her depleted veins -- a virus that for much of the next 23 years sapped Thompson's vitality and, a week and a half ago, finally killed her.

But the close relationship between her family and an AIDS support group, Rise n' Shine, will live on. At her funeral, Rise n' Shine members were front and center along with her husband, Jim, and sons Matt and Marc.

Rise n' Shine acted as "third, fourth and fifth parents," Jim Thompson said. "Without them, we'd have been alone in the middle of the ocean."

The first wave

Only after marrying and having children did Nancy learn that she had AIDS. Not only that, she may have unknowingly infected the three people she loved most.

"The stats at that time were about 50/50," Jim Thompson said, recalling the rate at which mothers with AIDS transferred it to their children. "With two kids, we didn't like those odds."

Medical tests uncovered a miracle: Jim and both infant sons were in perfect health.

But the overwhelming relief from those tests gave way to hardship from Nancy's deteriorating physical condition. Family finances dictated that Jim deliver Nancy's necessary full-time care himself, taking time and money away from care for the two little boys.

The Thompsons' savior came dressed like an elf.

Coincidental connection

News of Nancy's life-altering car accident never reached Janet Trinkaus in Vermont. The East Coast entrepreneur knew nothing of charity work and less of AIDS when she sold her restaurant in 1981 and moved 2,500 miles west to Bellevue.

She figured that a booming Northwest economy would offer countless job opportunities for an experienced businesswoman.

Trinkaus soon found work in commercial real estate and began her new life.

In 1988, however, came a revolution in her thinking. "I went on a personal retreat," Trinkaus recalls, "and when I came back, I knew I needed to work with kids affected by HIV and AIDS."

To that end, she founded Rise n' Shine, a non-profit organization providing emotional, financial and educational support to infected children and those with infected relatives. The enterprise cost Trinkaus everything -- her money, her farm, her time.

Back then, folks were uninterested in writing checks for what many perceived as a gay disease. Trinkaus kept going.

Having acquired a brief list of afflicted Snohomish County families, she phoned the Thompsons. That call launched a new direction in the lives of Matt and Marc Thompson -- away from the silent loneliness of a home darkened by terminal illness.

Trinkaus could not offer normalcy, but she could and did offer friendship and a helping hand. By Christmas, the Thompsons had added an honorary member to the family. Trinkaus sat beneath the tree in full elf regalia, distributing presents, laughter and hope.

"They convinced us that she was an elf," Marc Thompson said.

Growing up

Trinkaus could hardly have found more tragedy in one family. Jim Thompson's first wife committed suicide. His daughter from that first marriage died in a car accident at age 18. He lost both of his brothers to premature deaths as well.

"Some families just seem to get more than their share," Trinkaus said.

As the Thompson boys grew to understand their father's grief and mother's illness, Rise n' Shine grew as well. The organization adapted to meet developing needs, adding staff and volunteers as the client base expanded.

Matt and Marc Thompson attended summer camps, participated in support groups and were assigned a mentor.

"It was a place you could go and talk about things you were afraid to talk about in public," Marc Thompson said of any Rise n' Shine function. "You could get some time off."

The brothers enjoyed occasional normalcy -- a cross-country meet here, a theatrical performance there. Matt, now attending Skagit Community College with plans to become a firefighter, was the athlete. Marc, in his senior year of high school with aims to study theology and become a pastor, was the contemplative, poetic type.

Still, the boys needed regular refuge from the emotional fatigue of home life.

"It was like being in a mini-hospital," Matt Thompson said. "It was always really quiet around the house. We never really had too many people over at one time."

The end, sort of

Last week, a steady stream of family and close friends trickled into the chapel at Floral Hills Cemetery in Lynnwood. Pastor Jim Romak eulogized Nancy Thompson with biblical answers to the painful mysteries of human frailty.

"There has to be something redemptive to come from suffering," he said. "In the midst of death, we celebrate life."

A line of tearful family members sitting in the chapel's front row offered evidence of that, with the strength and intimacy of their bonds now forged in the fire of tragedy. Trinkaus sat with the Thompson brothers in the row reserved for family, dipping slightly as Marc folded his arms around her neck and sobbed into the shoulder of her overcoat.

Jim Thompson stood and offered tribute to his wife, reading from one of her many poems: "I need you so, to understand when I vent my rage. I'm only trying to overcome this demon I've engaged."

Nancy Thompson's battle concluded that day, her body lying peacefully in an open casket. Trinkaus and her organization, however, will carry on chasing demons. Jim, Matt and Marc Thompson all plan to join that fight in some capacity -- counseling, mentoring, fund raising.

The warmth of Rise n' Shine has melted away any Thompson family bitterness. All that remains is quiet mourning and a resolve to emulate the kindness of Trinkaus.

"She's really more of an angel to our family than a mother," Matt Thompson said.

An angelic elf, if you will, with a love for children and an ever-growing Christmas shopping list.

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