"They call it a cow heart," he says. "Wish they’d taken a picture of it for me." I place my hand over the stuffed pillow, and to my amazement I can feel the pounding of the new heart right through it. The donor was a twenty-year-old male killed in an accident, probably on a motorcycle. Last week, Rick and I joked about his surgeon, who in his "other life" races souped-up Camaros. "Maybe I’ll end up with my surgeon’s heart, Lindy?" "That would be bizarre, wouldn’t it?" I said. "But let’s not even joke about such things. We need that guy alive, awake and enthusiastic for your transplant. Maybe you should ask your nieces to only date guys with type O blood who race motorcycles, skydive, or are shot out of cannons!" Rick laughed, then got serious. "Do you think I’m going to make it?" All I can say is that I pray so, that everyone is praying for a miracle. It takes more than three long months of waiting, Rick confined to the same four walls of his hospital room, before an appropriate heart becomes available. In the meantime, friends and family provide a goodly supply of videotape movies, puzzles, craft sets, paint-by-number pictures, music CDs, and books, trying to keep Rick occupied as well as distracted. But it keeps getting harder and harder. Some days he spends hours and hours crying, and others in resignation to death, but every so often he enjoys the reprieve of hope. One morning during a visit, he surprises me by saying that his niece Natalie had visited during the night. This is a stunning revelation, since Natalie died tragically a couple of years ago of pneumonia, leaving behind an infant and a distraught fiancée, not to mention a horde of grieving relatives. "At 3:30 this morning I awoke to brilliant light in my room. Natalie was standing beside me taking my blood pressure. She said everything was going to turn out okay, that I would get a new heart." Tears trickle down my friend’s face; his body trembles. "I didn’t sleep the rest of the night. I must have cried for five straight hours. Waiting for a decent time to phone Myra [Rick’s wife], and Natalie’s mother was torturous. I swear she was standing right there, Linda!" He points to the left side of his bed. "Smiling. Beautiful. Peaceful. I swear to God." "I believe you, Rick. Natalie’s been close by during this entire process. She even let her presence be known at the fundraiser we held for you. Maybe she’s been assigned as your personal angel." "I hope so." By the time Rick receives his new heart, his tired-out cow heart has crushed his lungs, restricting his breathing, and is pressing on his stomach, giving him gut aches. Rick’s body is initially in a world of shock from the heart transplant, for it takes time to adjust to health after habituating to suffering. But those of us who love Rick rejoice in this miraculous challenge. We also remember to pray for the soul of the donor and comfort for his family — one family is in the throes of grief, the other jubilant with the prospect of many more years with their loved one. How miraculous that Rick’s new twenty-year-old heart is pumping blood through his body as arteries, veins, and capillaries dance to a new beat. He's even walking a mile a day! Rick is my former brother-in-law, and it’s just been in the past three years that I’ve found my way back to my ex-husband’s family. I know that love never dies, and so when I acknowledged the great loss I suffered from not being a part of them, I telephoned Rick’s wife, Myra. For the past 15 years or more, I’d thought of her as a lost sister. We had raised our children together, cooked and canned and shopped and partied with one another. In fact our son’s were born at the same time, down the hall from each other at the hospital. Today our children are still the best of friends. I formally stepped back into the family at Natalie’s funeral. I wanted all of them to feel my love and support. Ironically, I felt no awkwardness. With open arms, all of the nine brothers and sisters, plus their spouses and offspring, welcomed me, and we simply picked up where we had left off so many years before. When I heard of Rick’s predicament, I became actively involved in an upscale garage sale fund-raiser that the family sponsored. We raised over $8,000 to help Rick and Myra through the summer. And, since I am a Eucharistic minister for the Catholic Church, I began taking communion to him up at Oregon Health Science University Hospital two or three times a week. Even when others weren’t allowed in the room, the staff let me take the sacrament to Rick. Every time I drove up the Terwilliger Curves toward the hospital, I was cognizant that he could just as easily expire in that room as begin a new life. We had no way of knowing what God had in mind. Rick naturally vacillated between resignation to death and anxiety about dying and leaving his beloved family. The perception is that once one is on a waiting list for an organ donation, donated organs are easily accessible, but in the United States today more than 63,000 people are waiting for organ transplants. The people on these waiting lists could fill Portland’s Rose Garden more than three times! It is shocking to learn that fewer than 20,000 transplants were performed last year. Of the 15,000 deaths that occur in this country every year that could result in organ donations, only 5,000 actually do. A number of these potential donors are from the Pacific Northwest. Also unbelievable is the fact that of the people who are donors, 80% are women! If there is one message my friend, Rick Pfenning wants the public to embrace it is this: "Become a donor. Both men and women should have a "D" code on their driver’s licenses indicating that they wish to be tissue and organ donors. So many lives can be enhanced, saved, if people will just take this small step. I think men simply don’t think about it. It’s not that they are callous or lack compassion; the thought just doesn’t automatically pop into their heads." Another step people who decide to become donors need to take is to let their families know of their decision. It doesn’t do any good to have a "D" on your driver’s license if people don’t know that you want to be a donor. In the throes of grief, people aren’t about to take out your wallet and check your license. This is a great talking point for families. How many of us know our children’s wishes around this issue, or even our spouse's/significant other's for that matter? Death is uncomfortable to talk about, but ignoring the eventuality doesn’t make accepting it any easier. Like making out a will, this decision needs to be made prior to a person’s demise. Since none of us knows the day or the hour of our departure, I think it’s best to prepare in advance by making these decisions, and keeping ourselves "prayed up." In a recent Dear Abby article, a mother shared that when her daughter Karen’s life ended at 17, she was not aware that the young woman wanted to be a donor. Karen had signed the organ-donor card, but had never discussed the issue with family. The mother’s fear and ignorance about organ donation almost hindered the fulfillment of her daughter’s last wishes. Fortunately, a knowledgeable person came to the fore, explaining away her objections, most of which were based on myth. This mother reconciled some of her grief when four people, including a nine-year-old boy, were blessed with another chance at life; within the tragedy of Karen’s death these gifts of life were born. This month at my hospice in-service meeting, I learned that even people who die of cancer and other diseases are still able to donate skin and corneas. Almost anyone can donate corneas, as the eyes do not depend on blood supply. Some people worry that their loved one won’t be able to have an open-casket funeral if they are donors, but this is a myth. The bodies are restored to their full structure, so there should be no concern about disfigurement. What I know today is that without a donor, my friend Rick would be dead. There would be no more of his hugs for his children, grandchildren, or wife. This 58-year old man would be just another heart failure statistic among so many. There is no way to thank the donor, or even his family, for this remarkable gift of life, since hospitals are bound by the confidentiality of both donor and recipient. But it is our hope that just knowing that their son’s organs enhanced or saved as many as seventy people’s lives is something to rejoice about, and perhaps it even makes death less of an enemy. If you or any member of your family would like to become an organ and tissue donor, please call 1-800-355-SHARE. Recycle yourself, and give the gift of life! |
When he coughs, he squeezes a red heart-shaped pillow inscribed with white letters identifying its origin: American Heart Association. He’s hooked up to twelve IV lines. With jawbreaker-sized eyes he stares at me. "I made it," he says. "I can see that, pal," I say. My eyes fill with tears, while his continue to bulge in fake bravado. I watch the monitor as his heartbeat inches over 100 beats per minute. I know this is normal for transplants; Rick’s heart will continue to beat faster than most. A cough emerges again, and he sits up, crushing the pillow to his chest as he attempts to dislodge the phlegm. One of the grotesqueries of this ordeal is that Rick’s now-amputated heart was nearly the size of the pillow he’s clutching.