Organ Doantion

In March of 1999, I was given a gift from a person I never knew; a person I’ll never get to know. This gift cost the person who gave it to me, no money, but it was the most valuable gift I’ll ever receive. The gift was a piece of life from another person. At the age of twenty-four, I broke my hip. After three unsuccessful surgical attempts to heal it, my doctors performed a total hip replacement. The top four inches of my femur were sawed off, and the inside of my bone was hollowed out. A steel rod, nine inches long, was “pressed fit” into my bone. I was on crutches for over a year, but I really believed I would be able to walk on my own again. Less than one year after the surgery, I was back on crutches and in terrible pain. I had developed stress fractures in several places along my femur. For nearly one year I walked only when it was necessary and ate painkillers as though they were candy. Finally, my doctors decided to try something new. On March 9, 1999, my doctors took a ...