Diagnosis: Acute Myeloid Leukemia (AML). A Journey

While I was reading through the visit summary notes from George’s visit with the nurse practitioner last Tuesday, something caught my eye…a bit of information we have been trying to get our hands on since a bone marrow donor was found for George’s transplant. That is, the donor’s sex and age – two things that we had been told would be the maximum amount of information we could know about George’s donor for at least the first year or two. We had asked several doctors, PAs and NPs at the hospital for that information and they would always say they would “see what they could find out for us.” We never heard back.

But as I was skimming the notes, my eyes landed on something…something that made me stop skimming and expand the screen so I could be sure of what I was seeing…

And there it was…in black and white…

Donor: Blood type: O+. Age: 25. Sex: M HLA: 10/10 (perfect match!)

It probably doesn’t seem like a big deal to most people, because it’s not that much information. But for us…we have so many feelings of gratitude and wonder…of respect for this human being for donating his marrow to a complete stranger, for potentially saving George’s life. It is a piece of a puzzle that makes up the image we have in our minds of George’s donor..and that image looks like…

Some day we may be able to meet our hero…if he wants! That will be an amazing day indeed. And there won’t be adequate words to convey our gratitude and respect.