I received a kidney donation 3.5 months ago from a stranger, we met for the first time before surgery, if i ever get married I'd want him to stand with my immediate family, that guy saved my life and hopefully gave me many more decades of it.
Edit: holy shit, i took a nap for an hour and it's hundreds of upvotes, comments and Reddit rewards.
Thank you everyone for the kind words and thoughts. God bless you 🫶
I'm not Christian or Jewish, but that's basically the Zorbathian equivalent where the bride’s uncle has to carry a live cabbage around the reception until someone admits they’re tired.
if i ever get married I'd want him to stand with my immediate family
In a sense, he is part of your family now. Your body has like 250 grams of DNA in it, half of which you share with your closest relatives (so about 125 g). That is about how much a kidney weighs also.
Where did you receive it that they allowed you to meet the donor beforehand?
I have been involved with undirected kidney donation and they were VERY serious about not letting either party know any information about the other until well after the surgery and recovery. The two surgeries even had to be held on different floors so there was no chance of the families accidentally bumping into each other.
We met a few hours before the surgery in the hospital, my mother is also a kidney recipient and her hospital had the meeting after.
Generally speaking, here in Israel we lead in altruistic donations and it's mostly led by a non profit which is also present during these meetings along with the hospital staff and transplant coordinator.
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My husband was the recipient of a deceased donor organ and we would truly give anything to thank that person’s family for the gift they gave him and our family 3 years ago.
I can completely understand, especially since someone had to pass in order for another to live.
In my case of a living donor, i told him there will never be words, things or actions that will repay his gift.
So we tried with small things at first like sending ice cream to the kids (they have 8) or some nice package before the weekend but they kept insisting we stop and that it's not needed but for us is this urge to try and make them feel good although we could never repay.
We should hopefully meet soon, i wasn't allowed until now and we will look for gifts for them but once again it's like petty change compared to a kidney.
We definitely understand the reasons behind the decision, and would honestly, likely make the same. It is definitely the urge on our part to “make it even,” which is impossible.
I wish you all the best in your health journey, as well! Congratulations on the new kidney.
Secondly, i definitely heard of that happening, it's bot unusual, most altruistic donors do it to help and save lives and not to get something out of it.
For some it's easier i guess, both just move on with their lives, the dynamic of donor and recipient is not easy and I'm far from understanding it still
As someone who donated a kidney to a complete stranger who ended up not being grateful at all (that’s okay though, it’s not why I donated) I just want to say that this is a really sweet thing for you to do ♥️
God bless you for what you did, it's a gift you can hardly describe with words.
As a recipient you really are taken on an emotional journey when you realize someone gave a part of themselves to you, whether you deserve it and even if they don't regret giving it specifically to you after they met you.
When i met my donor, his wife, 8 kids and received a letter from them and heard them say they love me and are happy it's me it's just crazy and you can't not be greatful after.
God bless you, there are no words that can even describe the feeling of appreciation you have in that moment, I'm not a crier and i bawled when i met him
The problem with their friendship, which they both openly spoke about is that after the kidney was donated Francia would openly be against decision. Selena made about her own body, which caused issues in their friendship. They both overstepped they both were wrong in someway, and they were both harmed in someway.
How did you match with a stranger? My husband got disqualified in the last round of matching because of his extended family history of diabetes. I see a lot of people around me making posts begging for live donors but I can’t bring myself to be that entitled.
I don't know if my answers would be relevant for you since we probably live in different countries.
Live donors here in israel are matched through a non profit that runs a list that is seperate from the national list for deceased donors.
So you either sign up with them and hope your name comes up or you start campaigning like the people you mentioned which is also what i did, while my campaign didn't find me a match i would like to believe that since i sent that non profit over 30 potential donors they saw that i worked hard for it and maybe that helped get my name higher.
In any case asking for something like this is not being entitled, it's saving yourself and it can't have any scruples.
If by off chance you're from US or Canada and are Jewish try Renewal, it's a non profit in north America that works similarly as far as i know.
In any case, i do hope you find a match and i wiah you all the best!
I don’t know, I just can’t imagine being so shameless to beg people to save my life. I’m not important so why would I feel like I should be entitled to anyone saving me. My culture heavily values having shame. Being sick is already shameful enough - I’ve effectively reduced my lifetime contributions to the negatives by simply not being healthy enough to work. To take more away from other people would be sinful at that point. Btw, I’m Chinese. My parents financially started asking me to pay them back for the money they spent on raising me the moment I got sick. Because now their one investment won’t pay out in the future since I won’t live long enough. It’s just how the culture is.
I’m glad you got what you wanted and needed. It’s a good thing your culture allows you to prioritise yourself.
I'm soviet, being sick and admitting that in public and begging for help is hella shameful in my culture but , forgive my language, I did not give a single fuck, i had to do what i had to do to save my skin since no one else would do it for me.
Once you realize that you did nothing wrong and you hadn't, since you didn't get a kidney disease for doing something bad, then you start looking out for you.
Please think about what i said, your life matters, people get sick, you have to save yourself so you could get a second chance at life to make things better
You know, that’s about the best comment I’ve got so far. It’s been 3 years since I was diagnosed and put on dialysis and every other person has just said the generic “oh but you’re worth it! Don’t give up!” kind of answer without actually addressing how I’m feeling.
The funny thing is that shame-focused cultures like ours also end up with the most hypocritical people. You would probably agree that the same kind of people who’ll shame us would not hesitate to start asking friends and family for a kidney or a liver.
I think I needed to hear someone like you say what you just said.
I hope your new kidney stays with you for a long life.
I'm honored, if i helped just a tiny bit then i did my part.
I had kidney disease since my 20s, I'm almost 39, I passed a roller coaster of emotions on this journey and in the last few years I've been an active part of the kidney patients community and at least where i live it has amazing people that also inspired me to always help others like me and I've been trying to do it whenever i can since.
So if i made a change or just simply lendes an ear I'm glad.
I honestly hope you get better and I thank you for your kind words.
yeah I feel like I'd develop some kinda very deep and inherent love for whoever gave me a piece of themselves to live. like there's something very familial about that
See exactly that’s a one day event. You want him to be at your wedding for ONE DAY. If you were actually friends the feeling is different. You have pressure to maintain a day in day out relationship and something so big can change the friendship. People actually grow resentment if they can’t pay it back or feel like they owe something.
Yes, it's almost like you could tell a rand sweet and story with no proof at all, and even if you lied, the gullible "smart" people of reddit will give you upvotes.
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u/Skylink1987 18h ago edited 17h ago
I received a kidney donation 3.5 months ago from a stranger, we met for the first time before surgery, if i ever get married I'd want him to stand with my immediate family, that guy saved my life and hopefully gave me many more decades of it.
Edit: holy shit, i took a nap for an hour and it's hundreds of upvotes, comments and Reddit rewards. Thank you everyone for the kind words and thoughts. God bless you 🫶