GIVING THE GIFT OF LIFE
Calgary police officer Cliff O’Brien chats with Coriena Dickson and her son, Journey, — who requires regular transfusions — at the Sirens of Life Challenge, where police paramedics and firefighters answered the call for the need for blood donors.
When it comes to his gift of choice, Journey Dickson is a pretty typical little boy.
“Hot Wheels,” he says with a shy smile when I ask what he’s hoping to receive at his upcoming seventh birthday party.
Also, like any child his age meeting a new grown-up, that’s about all the conversation I can squeeze out of him. Still, there are some big differences between Journey and other kids his age, his given name hinting at his extraordinariness.
“He’s my hero,” says his mom, Coriena. “He’s been through so much already and he is a fighter.”
On Thursday morning, Dickson’s pint-sized inspiration has compelled her to do something she’s done only once before and, like most of us, dreads: stand at a podium, on a stage, and speak to a crowd of strangers.
“It’s scary, but if we can help others like us, then it’s worth it,” says the mother of three and one of two featured speakers at the launch of the 2018 Sirens for Life Challenge. It’s an annual blood drive in which members of the city’s police, paramedic and firefighting forces roll up their sleeves to donate and help raise awareness of the need for blood donations.
“Every 60 seconds, someone in Canada needs blood,” says Lisa Castro of Canadian Blood Services (blood.ca), at the Eau Claire clinic where the men and women in uniform will soon line up for their chance to donate.
Castro says that less than four per cent of Canadians eligible to donate in fact do, an uphill battle when you consider the need for 100,000 donors this year across the country. “People don’t want to go out in the cold,” she says of January, a particularly challenging time of the year for recruiting donors. “But the need never stops. We need blood, whether that’s for cancer patients, accident victims, heart surgeries or transplants.”
In the crowd listening to Dickson’s moving story about her family’s health struggles — her husband Doug and son Journey both have Diamond-Blackfan anemia, a rare blood disorder that has required more than 800 blood transfusions between the two of them — are local heroes, first responders who every day put their physical, emotional and mental health on the line.
Not surprising, then, that they come out in full force each year to help Canadian Blood Services. For the past 16 years, they’ve been coming out in big numbers each January, challenging their fellow police, paramedics and firefighters, along with their family and friends, to donate.
This year they have extra incentive, with one of their fellow first responders telling how blood transfusions helped to save his life.
“I felt great, I’d probably never been in better shape in my life,” Calgary firefighter Roy Kloepper tells me about the day in 2013 when, during a routine annual exam with the department’s wellness program, he found out he was a candidate for future liver failure. “My liver enzymes were elevated, but we all thought it was just a glitch,” says Kloepper, a captain. “I was told I might need a liver transplant down the road, in 20 or 25 years.”
In mid-2015, though, Kloepper was fighting for his life in hospital. A couple of brushes with death, several transfusions and a liver transplant later, today he is back on the front lines of answering emergency calls in Calgary.
“It’s one of the most selfless acts you can do,” he says of the simple gesture of donating blood. “You can save someone’s life.”
For Coriena Dickson, she’ll continue to rely on the generosity of those who give blood, as Journey, who has had five openheart surgeries, still requires blood transfusions every two to three weeks. It’s not surprising she puts the first responders in the same category as her courageous child.
“You are our heroes and saviours,” she says, her eyes filling with tears. “Thank you.”