CROWN POINT – “I’m no hero … all I did was get sick,” twice-blessed kidney transplant recipient Mark Reid told those gathered for the annual Donate Life Remembrance on April 22 at Franciscan Health Crown Point. “Those who donate their organs and their families – they are the heroes.”
Reid, a former Northwest Indiana paramedic whose second career involved teaching and coaching, related his journey back to health after being diagnosed with kidney failure resulting from diabetes. When a back injury sent him to a doctor who asked him, “How long have you been in kidney failure?”, Reid was quickly put on the organ transplant list, where the average wait is five years.
“I posted on Facebook that ‘I need a job and I need a kidney,’ hoping a bit of humor would help, I got calls asking if the post was real, and I had friends offer, but when they realized what it involved – that they would have only one kidney – they backed out, and I don’t blame them,” said Reid.
It was the mother of the quarterback on the high school team Reid had coached who became determined to follow through after reading the Facebook post in a restaurant. “She appreciated how I had mentored her son, and she literally had to stalk me to make it happen, because I didn’t want her to donate,” Reid admitted. “Finally, God told me to go ahead, and we drove down to Indianapolis together with my wife, Trish, to have the transplant on Jan. 4.”
Reid lost 27 pounds in 24 hours after his new kidney started working, “and I was healthy, and life was good.”
He tried to stay healthy by bicycling with his wife, even taking a trip from the Appalachian Trail west to the Santa Monica Pier in California. Still teaching, Reid even accepted the challenge of instructing physical education classes on Zoom during the COVID-19 pandemic, but despite taking every precaution, he caught the virus. “I was a week away from living 10 years with my new kidney when I had to go back on the transplant list,” he said.
This time, a former softball player he had coached, now an ICU nurse, wife and mother of two, called to say, “I decided I want to be a donor.” Reid’s response was “For me?” and she said yes.
After that second successful transplant, Reid said, “I decided that I had to pay it forward.” He went back to school to earn a ministerial degree.
“I give lots of talks about organ donations,” Reid added. He wrote a book with his donor after the first transplant and is now writing a second book. He still bikes with his wife and drinks more than a gallon of water a day to keep his donor kidney healthy.
“I hope you can see by my attitude up here that I feel blessed that two people gave me their kidney,” he said. “I am the luckiest man in the world.”
Reid encouraged his audience to consider registering as an organ donor. “One in five kidneys that could be donated (after a death) is discarded,” he noted, “and 15 people a day die waiting for a kidney transplant.”
Also telling a compelling story at the Donate Life program was Steve Davis, who brought a photo of his late son, Matthew, who “changed the lives of three people” by becoming an organ donor after his death three years ago at the age of 39.
“You never expect a child to die before you,” said Davis, of Crown Point, explaining that his son had registered as an organ donor on his driver’s license. “His life was cut short, but he is still with us.”
“Matthew’s long journey included 18 months in and out of hospitals and nursing homes, but the quality of life for three families was changed forever … when he donated both kidneys and his liver on Feb. 4, 2023,” Davis said. “Now, on the fourth of every month, we light a candle and post his picture.”
Davis said his family offered to share his son’s story with the recipients of his organs some time ago, and one has replied. “They think of Matthew as their angel … we hope to meet with them soon.”
Also at the event, nursing administrator Katrina Hejnowski read a proclamation for Donate Life Month, and attendees heard briefly about the importance of organ and tissue donation from Lauren O’Day, donation coordinator for the Gift of Hope Organ & Tissue Network; Amanda Hawkins, professional services/aftercare coordinator for the VisionFirst Indiana Lions Eye Bank; and Melissa Meyer, director of hospital development for Life Line Stem Cell.
Father Tony Janik, O.F.M., director of Spiritual Care Services for the hospital, opened the program with prayer and celebrated a Mass after the program in remembrance of organ, eye, tissue, cord blood and birth tissue donors and recipients.
Caption: Melissa Meyer, director of Hospital Development for Life Line Stem Cell, explained at the Donate Life Remembrance hosted by Franciscan Health Crown Point on April 22 that the program to collect stem blood and stem cords from mothers after birth that began at that very hospital has now expanded to include 32 hospitals that provide that needed tissue to burn victims and others. Seated at her right is Father Tony Janik, O.F.M., director of Spiritual Care Services at the hospital, who offered an opening prayer at the program and celebrated a Mass in honor of all donors and recipients..(Marlene A. Zloza photo)
