Last month I accompanied one of my closest friends to Washington DC to be by her side while she donated her Stem Cells to an anonymous person. Meet Liz. She lives in California, works in the entertainment industry, teaches yoga, and is a world traveler. She's also my best friend and one of the greatest people around.
Liz signed up through the Gift of Life Foundation to be a bone marrow donor. 7 years later, she got a call informing her that she's the perfect match for someone. She knows nothing about the person, except that he's a 65 year old man with a blood disease called Multiple Myeloma. Being the incredible, selfless person that she is, Liz of course commits to the donation.
This all went down during a bad snowstorm at the Georgetown University Hospital. The rooms and halls were empty...no one was around. Joey, Liz's boyfriend, myself, and Nick, our Gift of Life liaison, were all there during the 7 hour donation. I had no idea how emotional and exhausting this procedure would be. Its pretty incredible to see this process... to see that the second they got the amount of stem cells needed, there was someone there with a cooler ready to pick up and deliver the donation. Because of the storm that day, all flights and trains were cancelled out of DC....but those stem cells were getting where they needed to go.(that information was kept private)
Liz will have the option, in a year, to connect with the Man who received her Stem Cells.
This was such an inspiring experience to be a part of. Of course, I had to document this...but also wanted to share the story.
