Sarah Lamont is a devoted mother who is willing to do everything in order for her son, Joe, to live a normal and healthy life. When she found out that she could be an organ donor in order to save her son’s life, she didn’t even think twice.
“He is so precious I couldn’t bear life without him”
Sarah, 36, and a mother-of-three, will be donating two of her organs, one-third of her liver and her kidney, to her son Joe who is suffering from autosomal recessive polycystic kidney disease, a disease which caused Joe’s kidneys to stop functioning. She will be the fifth woman in the UK to become a double donor.
She shares, “Joe has got high blood pressure in his liver and he could bleed to death from blood vessels rupturing. I wasn’t prepared to wait and wait and lose him.”
“He is so precious I couldn’t bear life without him.”
However, the operations to take out Sarah’s organs are not without risk as removing her liver has a 1-in-250 risk of death, and removing her kidney has a 1-in-4000 risk.
She had no second thoughts
Despite the risks, Sarah didn’t have any second thoughts when it came to the decision to become an organ donor. She shared that her son was on the list to receive organs for over a year-and-a-half, and that Joe was missing out on life.
That’s when she decided to approach Birmingham Children’s Hospital and asked if she can donate one of her kidneys as well as a part of her liver to save her son’s life.
Thankfully, Sarah was a perfect match for Joe, and both of them will soon be undergoing under the knife so that her liver can be taken out and will be transplanted in her son’s body. After a few months of recovery, they will again both undergo surgery, this time to remove one of Sarah’s kidneys and transplant it into her son.
Sarah has two other children, aged 10 and 12, and she’s looking forward to the future when Joe can lead a normal life and play with his big brother Max, and his big sister Eve.
Photo from: Youtube.com/ Online News
Go to the next page to learn more about myths surrounding organ donation.
Myths surrounding organ donation
The choice to be an organ donor can be difficult for a lot of people for a number of reasons. However, you shouldn’t let myths and misconceptions prevent you from saving someone else’s life. Here are various myths surrounding organ donation:
- If I agree to be an organ donor, the hospital won’t try to save my life. For some people, they fear that signing the organ donor form while they’re in a hospital would mean that the hospital would just wait for them to die so they can get their organs. This is untrue, and health professionals will do everything that they can in order to save your life.
- It’s against my religion. A lot of people might think that it’s against their religious beliefs to donate an organ. However, major religions such as Catholicism, Islam, most branches of Judaism, and most Protestant faiths do allow organ donation. If you’re still unsure, it’s best to talk to a member of your clergy to learn more.
- People who donate organs can’t have an open casket funeral. This is another myth that a lot of people mistakenly believe. Organ donation doesn’t at all interfere with an open casket funeral, and there’s really no visible difference that anyone can see.
- I’m not healthy, no one would want my organs. There are very few medical conditions that can prevent you from donating organs, so don’t think that just because you’re not in the pink of health, you won’t be able to be an organ donor. The doctors will be the one to decide that.
- My family will pay the cost for the organ donation. This is another myth that a lot of people mistakenly believe. They think that if they decide to become an organ donor, then their family would shoulder the costs. The costs are actually paid for by the family that will receive the organ, so don’t worry about it.
Sources: mirror.co.uk, mayoclinic.org
READ: Two-year-old with rare heart condition dies without an organ donor
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