There is a photo on the wall in my house. A framed picture of a beautiful young woman with honey blonde hair falling past her shoulders and a sweet, shy smile. She’s not my wife, my sister or my daughter. Not even a friend. I never knew her while she was alive. But she means everything to me.
Here’s the sad fact of the matter: She lost her life at age 28 and I regained mine at age 56. Even staring at those two numbers I struggle to find God’s justice in them, to see where his mercy lies.
But it would be wrong of me to question his plan. Instead, I express gratitude for every day I have left, for every breath given to me.
A half dozen years ago I was diagnosed with a deadly combination of emphysema and chronic bronchitis. My lungs were severely damaged, and I was placed on oxygen 24/7.
Finally, the doctor said those words no patient ever wants to hear: “There is nothing more we can do for you.” Nothing more than a double lung transplant. If I should survive long enough to get one.
When you become a candidate for a transplant—and I was considered a good risk because apart from my lungs I was healthy—you are put on a list. It’s a bit like living on death row, waiting for a reprieve. Every day, you wonder if you will be called. Every day you aren’t feels like another death sentence.
Although you try not to think about it, it’s a matter of odds. Where are you on the list? Are you close to the top? Who will die so that you can live?
I tried not to think about that, but to simply trust in God. Trust in his plan. But that got a lot harder when I was moved from the list at the Cleveland Clinic to Methodist Hospital in Indianapolis. The former does more than five times the number of lung transplants than the latter each year.
By June I was struggling to breathe even on eight liters of oxygen per day. The slightest task drained me. I knew that I wouldn’t live to see my birthday in August.
Then I got the call. July 20. They thought they had a set of lungs that would match my body size, blood and tissue type. Was this the reprieve I’d hoped and prayed for? I was rushed to the hospital. They ran me through a barrage of tests and wheeled me into surgery.
Within 24 hours of the call, I was in the ICU, recovering. Awake. Lucid. I took a breath. And another. Cool air rushed into my chest. I kept drawing it in, filling my new lungs to capacity before exhaling. Never had something so basic to life seemed like such a divine gift. Never had a breath tasted sweeter.
I went from the ICU to a private room, gaining strength each day but sleeping fitfully. Someone had died to give me this miracle. That was always on my mind.
I didn’t want to think about what the donor’s family was going through. That thought, more than the beeping monitors and the nurses coming in to check on me, kept me awake and restless.
On my fourth night in the hospital, I found myself staring at the clock, watching the minutes tick by. It was 2:00 A.M. and the room was lit only by a ribbon of light coming from the open door. I could hear the nurses talking at the nurses’ station and then footsteps.
Someone appeared in the doorway, the light like an aura behind her. A young woman in a hospital gown.
She stepped into the room and took two paces toward me.
“Who are you?” I asked. “Are you my nurse just coming on duty?”
“I am your organ donor,” she said. “I wanted to check on you and tell you that everything is going to be all right.”
I couldn’t respond. I just stared at her, this young woman illuminated by the hallway light, taking in every detail of her features. Her face was aglow.
Then she turned and walked back into the hallway, disappearing as quickly as she had come.
Mentally I pinched myself. No, I wasn’t dreaming. Yes, I knew what I’d experienced was impossible. My donor could not have appeared at my bedside. It had to be someone else. But who was she and why did her words give me such sudden relief and reassurance?
For very good reasons, you can never get in touch with your donor’s family unless they reach out to you. Even then, hospital protocol precludes any contact for months. But I wrote a letter to the donor’s family expressing my gratitude and my sympathy, and gave it to a hospital administrator. It was the least I could do.
To my surprise, I soon received a letter in return. It was from the mother of my donor. She asked me to give her a call.
She was warm and kind, all the things I hoped for, and was happy to meet with me. A kind of closure, perhaps for both of us.
Her 28-year-old daughter, Priscilla, had died in a car accident. The family had been devastated by such a tragic loss. I hoped to show the mother that something good had come from it.
We met for lunch, and I told her about the blessing of her daughter’s gift. How my daily death sentence had been lifted. I even told her about the strange visitor to my hospital room. My story seemed to give her some comfort.
“What about your daughter?” I asked. “She must have been really wonderful.”
“She was,” her mother said, and poured out her heart.
When she was done, she reached into her purse and removed a photograph for me to see.
That was when I took my deepest breath yet. For it is the very same photo I keep on my wall today. Long blonde hair, clear blue eyes, the shy sweet smile.
The woman who came to my room that night in the hospital.
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