Back in May of 2009 Bill was deployed overseas so I watched alot of TV! One night a story came on about Rihanna, she was heading up a bone marrow donation search for a little girl named Jasmina Anema who was fighting for her life against leukemia. The story brought me to tears and it was right then that I went online to DKMS and signed up to be a bone marrow donor.
A couple weeks later I received a packet in the mail with information and a kit to take a cheek swab and send it back to them. As soon as I could I sent my cheek swab in and honestly didn't think I would ever be contacted. According to DKMS only 1 in 200 people on the registry are ever contacted as a match. Doctors from all over use the DKMS registry to find donors for their patients and unfortunately they do not all find donors. We can change this by getting as many people as we can added to the registry!
Tonight I sat down on the couch, grabbed my computer and checked my email. I saw a message with the subject "Bone Marrow Donor: Important Update" before I even opened it I assumed it was your typical email asking me to update contact info. Boy was I wrong! The email came from a Request Management Coordinator at DKMS in the email she explained that a doctor somewhere believes that I am a match for a leukemia patient and it is imperative that I contact them as soon as possible. At the end of the email it stated "It’s critically important that we hear from you-even if you’re unable to donate" Not Donate?!?!?! I couldn't even imagine saying no to saving someones life! Regardless of how old the patient is, that's someones baby and I couldn't even imagine having to find a donor for my own daughter, of course I'm going to move forward.
As soon as I told Bill what was going on I called her! Of course it was 8pm here and I was calling New York so it was 11pm there, I left a message and returned to the email. In the email the coordinator sent a bunch of information as well as a 12 page questionnaire. It basically covered all of the typical health questions. They wanted to know what medications I was on, hospitalizations, if I've been to Africa, have HIV/AIDS, bleeding problems and any other major health and travel history. I filled out all of the paperwork, scanned it and emailed it back to the coordinator! All I could keep saying to be was "I may really be someones real life super hero!"
To say I'm excited about what this may mean is an understatement! I still have to talk to the coordinator, get some more blood tests done as well as a physical examination to make sure all is good to go but, someone may end up living a long wonderful life because I was a bored military wife one night two years ago!
I thought it would be nice to blog about this whole experience in hopes of letting people know how the process works and getting more people to join the registry. Hopefully I'll have more for you tomorrow!!!
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