She made a big belly laugh when I told her she was a “mini-me.” That’s right, she’s tiny but has a big heart under that little core. Meet Kimberly, my heart buddy. Just one organ saved her too! And now her life is big. She has big plans to participate in the transplant games in 2010, she is traveling overseas this fall and just last week she celebrated another birthday.
Birthdays are a little more special now for her and for me and for Steve and Ted. It means another year in good health, past, done, check. For Kimberly, it meant writing her donor family who she thanks everyday. A few sentences of her most recent letter go like this:
I am able to celebrate another birthday today because of the healthy heart beating my chest. Jonathan is able to celebrate another birthday because of the healthy lungs in his chest allowing him to breathe. Jonathan and I met today to celebrate our birthdays, which we would not otherwise be celebrating if it were not for the best gift anyone could receive - The Gift of Life because of organ donation. Jonathan and Kimberly have the same donor and are pictured here.
Things like birthdays, boat rides and lunch with a friend mean so much to Kimberly now. It means another day here and a slight distraction from the world of a transplant recipient. It means freedom from the hospital and the ability to breathe in fresh air. She loves hot, humid days and won’t complain one bit if it’s summer until Halloween this year in Chicago. Her story began at age 10 when her father was listed for a heart transplant and told that he had passed his cardiomyopathy onto his children. It was the 70’s when only about 18 heart transplants were done per year and unfortunately, her father passed. Kimberly wishes her father got his second chance at life because she says maybe then she would remember him a little more. I feel though, her father saved his spot so that she and her brother, he was also effected could have their chance. And they did, with their father watching over them from above. Kimberly got the call on March 3, 2007. There have been a few bumps along the way but today she walks faster than me! Can you imagine the outpouring of support she and her family have given one another just to survive through the loss of one parent and the sickness of 2 other family members. Only her sister and mother were spared from familial cardiomyopathy. While her brother did get a second chance a life, he lost his fight 15 years after his heart transplant due to kidney failure and lymphoma. In our lifetimes, Kimberly and I hope for better drugs and more donors. We want everyone to feel the rush of life like we do now.
We’re heart buddies now and forever. We will meet even more buddies (like Jason, pictured here with us) as the days go one and our years in this elite club multiply. Until then, we talk about her dating and my golfing and soon enough we will share the experience of the 2010 Transplant Games together. We can’t wait!
