THE GIFT OF A NEW LIFE
Our province has one of the lowest organ donor rates in Canada but these three Saskatchewan residents did receive the gift of life. Their circumstances are different, but their plea is the same: Consider being an organ donor. Here are their stories as tol
After three years on disability leave, the 30-year-old was overjoyed to return to her administrative position at an engineering firm in Saskatoon on Monday.
“It will be part time at first, but by December it should be fulltime hours,” Nelson said tearfully. “It’s scary, but I’m getting my life back.”
Resuming a normal life wouldn’t have been possible without an organ donor.
Nelson was diagnosed with pulmonary fibrosis at 18. Although she had no symptoms, she got tested because she’d lost 16 family members to the disease.
At 27, her health quickly declined. Nelson had a dry cough and was short of breath, so she avoided steps and parked close to doors because walking any distance left her breathless.
“Within six months, I was on oxygen and within 10 months I was off work and on disability,” she said. “I went from going to the gym multiple times a week to not being able to walk and talk at the same time anymore.”
Kinsmen Telemiracle helped fund some travel, accommodations and food costs, but the young couple still had bills to pay at home.
Her family held a steak night to help defray costs that Nelson estimates were around $10,000.
In July 2014, Nelson received the call that changed her life and she and her husband took an air ambulance to Edmonton.
It’s taken time, but now she’s picking up the pieces of her life before she got sick.
“By being a donor, you’re saving someone else’s life,” she said. “It helped my friends, my family — it has a huge impact.”
SHARILYN MCCRACKEN
McCracken was living in Moose Jaw when she got her life-saving call.
Born with cystic fibrosis, McCracken’s lung health was progressively worsening.
Her lung capacity hovered between 20 per cent and 25 per cent before the 37-year-old had a double lung transplant in Edmonton in the spring of 2004.
“I didn’t do a whole lot other than exist,” McCracken said. “I wasn’t walking my dogs and I couldn’t do much other than some household chores and resting a lot. Most of the energy you might get in eating is used up in breathing.”
Following consultations in Edmonton, McCracken was put on the transplant list in December, and she was called for the surgery in May.
She was flown by air ambulance from Moose Jaw to Edmonton, where she had the transplant.
About a month after the transplant, her breathing function was at 100 per cent.
“It’s been 12 years since I’ve had it and I’m not sure that I would have had two years left at the time I received it,” McCracken said. “It has changed my life in that way and of course, it’s changed my relationships because I can contribute more, and it’s changed the lives of my parents and my husband, Stan.”
She encourages Saskatchewan residents to talk to their families about being an organ donor.
“It’s a tragic time — whether it’s sudden or you know it’s coming — so to make that decision on your own, it can be traumatic,” McCracken said.
Currently, next of kin can override a donor sticker on a health card.
McCracken is in favour of presumed consent or “opt out” legislation, which is in place in jurisdictions such as Spain, resulting in greater numbers of organs being available.
JASON STAMM
His life changed in a heartbeat. Instead of having the flu, the 28-year-old was diagnosed with heart failure.
“It was when the Grey Cup was here in 2003 that I was supposed to meet some friends at a cabaret the night before. I said, ‘I’ll lay down and have a nap and then I’ll come.’ I didn’t wake up until the morning and I was really short of breath. I was gasping for air, so I drove myself to the hospital.”
Tests were inconclusive and Stamm was going to be sent home from the ER, but he insisted something was wrong.
More tests followed, and the Reginan was diagnosed with heart failure.
For 18 long months, he waited for the phone to ring saying a donor heart was available. That day finally came on July 4, 2005.
But when Stamm left for Edmonton, he still wasn’t sure the transplant would happen. Twice before he’d been rushed to the University of Alberta Hospital when a donor heart was available, but either the heart was a better match for another patient or the organ was unusable.
“My health changed very quickly,” Stamm said. “Had it not been for (a donor), I would not have lived. My goal was to see my children grow up and graduate. My son just graduated last year and I have a daughter in Grade 12, so it’s been a second chance.”
He hopes more people waiting for organs will get a second chance. “I received an unbelievable gift,” Stamm said. “If you have healthy organs, why not give them to someone who is just wanting a chance at more life?”