This story feels like a legend—but it’s real. In our latest episode, we explore a Venetian family haunted for generations by a mysterious medical curse. Their terrifying journey inspired one of the earliest stories of what’s now known as a rare brain disease.
In 1983, a man from Veneto, Italy, felt a sudden, intense heat while dancing with his elderly mother on a cruise ship. He couldn’t cool down and began sweating uncontrollably. When he looked in the mirror, he realized something was very wrong: his pupils had shrunk to tiny dots. He knew, painfully, that he was facing the same fate as his ancestors before him—this was no ordinary illness.
The family had long whispered of a curse—one that brought on terrible illnesses, strange brain symptoms, and early deaths across generations. But this was more than superstition—it was something real and undeniable.
Doctors refused to dismiss the man’s fears. He agreed to spend months at a neurological institute where specialists monitored him closely and recorded his brain activity. After his passing, his brain was studied—and what they found changed medical history. His thalamus (the brain’s sleep center) was riddled with holes. It was a new disease: fatal familial insomnia, a rare genetic disorder that stops the brain from regulating sleep—and life.
What began as whispers of a curse became scientific discovery. This Venetian family taught the world about a deadly brain disease, and gave researchers a starting point for understanding, diagnosing—and maybe one day curing—it.
🎥 Watch the full episode now:
Medical Mysteries: The Cursed Venetian Family
Kitchen Table Research — We Investigate. You Listen.