an Organ Donor Saved Mine"
It was 0820am on the 2nd October, 1998. I had just finished eating my breakfast cereal as I answered the phone, and a doctor I hadn�t heard of introduced himself, and asked me if I was feeling fine. I thought �What on earth ��?� nobody rang a stranger, and asked him how he was. It didn�t dawn on me that it might be the call I had waited six years to hear. Eventually he told me that they had a kidney for me, and that I was to present myself for a transplant in Brisbane a.s.a.p.
By 03.30 that Friday afternoon, I was in theatre, undergoing major surgery. After about five hours, I was back in the ward with tubes hanging out of me in all sorts of places. As you lie there, realizing that some complete stranger has just saved your life, you tend to think about who he or she was. Actually I also thought about the relatives, who had made the decision to sign the authority to donate. What amazing strength it must have taken. At a time when they had just lost someone so precious, they were still able to make the decision, to donate his organs so that others might live. Others that they may never ever meet.
I began to improve healthwise, within the first couple of days, and was able to leave hospital as an inmate, on the fourth day. Daily visits were kept up for six weeks, to fine tune my anti-rejection medication. After that, the visits were extended to three times a week, and subsequently extended until now; I am on a visit to the specialist, every three months, three and a half years down the track.
At 37 my Donor was too young to die, and it should never have happened, but through no fault of his own, it did. While alive, my donor won a medal for bravery, and was often involved in saving lives in his chosen volunteer work. And by his passing, he was still able to save another six lives. Although I may be biased, because one of them was my own, he couldn�t have done it if he wasn�t an Organ Donor, and his amazing family, hadn�t given their permission, for his wishes to be carried out.
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