My wife and I decided to write letters to you separately. So each letter is marked below.
Dear Donor Family –
As I sit down to write this letter, my curious one-and-half year old son is playing at my feet. I get to witness him diligently take everything out of my bottom drawer of my desk and then look up at me and say “all gone”. After he’s done, he run’s into the other room in excitement. It is, after all, bath time and he loves “swemmeeing” in the bathtub. Although when his mother, my wife, goes to grab him to take him downstairs to his nightly routine, he immediately runs away and giggles. I’m sure this is normal for the average toddler, but I like to think he already is showing signs of my playful and spontaneous nature. This might sound like an average night in a ever-growing household in Anytown, U.S.A. It is, however, anything but average. Every bit of it is absolutely amazing because, for me, it was something that I might of never been able to witness. However, I did and I am. And that is because your family made a decision that directly changed the course of my life.
When I was 19, I was diagnosed with an auto-immune condition called Primary-Sclerosing Cholangitis. Which is a mouthful of syllables to describe – for undetectable reasons – that my body was in the process of slowly attacking a vital part of my liver, which over time, eventually would cause it to shut down. I thought we had an answer to this issue many years back, when my first savior, my little brother decided to donate half his liver to me to “fix” the issue. My liver doctors had explained, many times, that there was a still a high chance that my brother’s donated half liver and the rest of my body might be too similar in overall structure (DNA, environmental, etc.). This meant it would have a higher probability of re-occurrence of my original condition. They turned out to be correct. Five years after that surgery, I was told again, that an eventual detrimental disease had taken over and was now attacking my new liver. This left me with only a single option- to be placed on the transplant list and wait. I would wait for an undetermined amount of time until I was sick enough to be in desperate need and then I would have nothing but hope and faith that amazing things can still happen. That a vital and life saving organ, that was a perfect match to my exact need, would appear before I ran out of time. Thanks to you, it did.
I’m truly sorry for the loss of your child. If I had the power to reverse the outcome, I would not wish your fate on any soul. I cannot imagine not spending another day with my child and to do so, knowing that I would have to go on living without him would be pure agony. However, it is for this very reason that I’m truly grateful to an unmeasurable level for what you did. You allowed your son’s life and energy to help me in my greatest time of need. I can only hope that I can live up to the standard you have set for me and my family as a model for how to create unimaginable positive impact on world around all of us. I’m thankful that you made a choice that allows me to clearly pass on to my son, and others such an amazing gift. A clear example of how people can thrust positive energy into the world, even at the lowest of points in their lives. Thank you from the bottom of my heart and soul for making a decision that saved my wife’s husband, my son’s father and most of all me.
Love, N.
You may read the letter from the recipient’s wife here