I don’t do bucket lists, FB likes, or retweet something that I find inspiring. I do big things; like donating a kidney. And big things sometime make me stop and question things. It took me more than a year to figure out why I wanted to donate a kidney.
What kind of world did I want to live in? I didn’t want to just repost something from FB. I wanted to do something. I wanted to live in a world in which this is how people treated each other. I wanted change, not just with myself, but on a scale that is frightening. Change that spoke not only to the core of who we are, but also why we are here.
Did I need to be special to donate? As it was looking like I was going to be approved one of the questions my social worker asked was, “Have you told your ex-wife(mom of my kids)?” I skirted the issue, “Do I have to?” “We recommend it,” she said. I sent a text that night to my ex with the expectation that she wouldn’t understand me, or what I was doing. We had had our problems, and I figured she’d point out how wrong this was. She replied with, “That is the most incredible decision I’ve ever heard of.” At that point I realized I didn’t have to be special to donate.
I am more powerful than I realize. We can solve a lot of problems on this planet, but we haven’t solved kidney disease. I can’t drop money into a cup and expect this to be cured. It still takes another human being to help.
By the way, my one kidney donation started a chain that allowed three recipients to get kidneys. Sometimes we really are bigger than we truly realize.