Time for another installment of this Wednesday/Sunday night series!
Picking up from last time –
[Edited to add: The guy I originally tried to give to from MatchingDonors… He died 3 days after this posted, waiting for a kidney. So, that’s really devastatingly sad. And also, makes me feel a little weird about trying to see the silver lining about giving to a stranger. But it also kind of drills the point home that if you don’t ever get entangled emotionally about a stranger’s life, you won’t have this weird sadness about someone you never knew.]
I mentioned in the last post, that after learning if things don’t work out at one hospital/with one person, you can actually give to a new stranger – like never know/never meet them type of stranger. Spoiler alert (I suppose, though I have mentioned it many times haha): I was rejected from this hospital completely… Ultimately for various reasons, I was not able to give a kidney to the man I originally was there to try to give to. But at least now we’re like semi-friends, or at least acquaintances. And I can’t wait for the day when I find out he’s gotten a kidney from someone else!
So, anyway, since me being an integral part of his journey seems off the table, let’s get into all the silver linings of giving to a stranger – which is what I’ll be doing next!
For one thing, which has been mentioned (sorry to retread ground here), I do not want to be judge and jury! I don’t want to decide based on a profile and a photo who deserves to get her life back and who doesn’t. That is too much pressure. Plus too much bias can seep in.
Also, I don’t want this person to feel beholden to me for the rest of her life. I don’t want her to feel pressured to send me holiday cards or to show me she’s using her kidney in crazy adventures. If she is, great. But I don’t want her to feel nervous that I’m watching her.
Also, let’s get real. I might watch her a little! If I see that that person’s being really irresponsible and not taking care of her kidney, I’m probably not going to be the most pleased person in the world. (I get that we’re all human. But do I want to see that?)
Not to mention, what if the person does every single thing she’s supposed to – she takes all her medicines, eats great, exercises – but her body rejects my kidney? The chances of that happening are small. But it is possible. I do NOT want to see that.
I so awesome about the idea of never having any idea who got my kidney.
Some people have been playing devil’s advocate with me. “If you never know, then how do you know you didn’t save a serial killer or someone else who does horrific things?”
I won’t know. But I just have to hope that that didn’t happen. And even if my kidney saved a serial killer (although really, let’s not think like this), it got a non-serial killer closer to the top of the list. Teeniest tiniest silver lining ever, perhaps?
But I mean, if we’re going to big extremes here, maybe if my kidney goes to a serial killer, it bumps up the person who’s gonna cure cancer and world hunger up just enough that they get to live and do that. (Realistically, it’s not gonna go to outliers like that. so, I don’t know why we’re being like this haha.)
I believe in humans. And I believe there are no “good” or “bad” people, but that we all do some good and some bad things (some more than others).
Most of us strive to do more good than bad. I believe my kidney will help the world more than it will hinder it. And I choose to believe that the person who gets it is one of the people trying to do more good than bad in her life.
More kidney story coming at you next time!