I love Christmas, I love spending time with my family and the giving spirit. Being a mother of 4, I'm used to being the one giving, but this year I received a very special gift.
Community Service is very important to me, I like to help out whenever I can. I've donated blood regularly since I found out my blood was a rare type when I was 16. But then I became anemic and wasn't allowed to anymore. So when I saw the sign for the Bone Marrow Registry a few months back, I thought that could be a good replacement!
The Bone Marrow Registry is just that - a list of people to search through when someone needs a bone marrow transplant. To get on the registry, it's a simple Qtip swab in your cheek. It's painless and it takes less than 1 minute. Then if you're a match for someone, you'll be contacted.
So I grabbed my form, planning to go the next day and join the registry. Well I was disqualified on the first question. I was upset and my husband Karl was so good listening to my ranting. I didn't really expect he understood how I felt, it took years of me bugging him to just get him to be an organ donor (that's a no brainer I thought).
So now it's been a few months since my bone marrow was rejected. Yesterday, I went yo get the mail and there was a letter for the Registry. I opened it up to find....
KARL'S new membership card!
It turns out the day of the drive, Karl went down and signed up to be a donor to take my place. I couldn't believe it. I have never in my life received a meaningful, thoughtful, and just wonderful gift. I am so blessed to have my family, and I'm wishing all of you the same blessings this holiday!
If you're also interested in joining the Bone Marrow Registry, you can find all of the information right here:
http://marrow.org/
"10,000 patients need a marrow transplant. Only half receive one. Half is not enough."
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