You Better Be A Donor or Else....

As most of you know, organ donation has already saved my life once, thanks to a very special family who made a decision that their young son's death would not be in vain. They chose to donate all of his organs after loosing their precious boy due to a 4-wheeler accident in July of 2001. I will be forever grateful to them for their gift. There are over 100,000 people on the waiting list in the U.S. for organs needed to save their lives. Unfortunately, many of those people die waiting. So that is why I am dedicating this post to convincing you that you need to make your wishes known to your loved ones (along with putting the sticker on your license) that if you should be in that situation, you want your organs to be donated.

So, first I am going to counter a few myths about donation that are commonly heard:
1. "If I am in the emergency room and there is someone else that needs an organ, they wouldn't try as hard to save me"
This is not true at all! First of all, a doctor "whose specialty most closely matches your particular emergency"* will be the one treating you. Transplant teams are not even made aware of the patient until the patient is brain dead, with their body still working. The doctors conduct numerous tests to see if there is any chance of recovery, and only after that is your family consulted about possibly donating your organs!
2."I'm under 18, I can't make that decision anyways"
Well, technically that is true. But if you speak to your parents seriously and make them aware of your desire to donate your organs, most parents will want to respect their children's wishes. While you can't control what is done when you are dead, you can help influence their decision. It may also help them cope with their loss by knowing that part of you is still living in someone else, or that they did exactly what you would've wanted.
3. "I want to have an open casket at my funeral, but if I donate, I can't"
If someone donates their internal organs, it is not noticeable once the body is clothed. If they donate their eyes, a glass eye is inserted and the eyes are closed during the viewing anyway. For bone donation, a rod is placed where the bone is removed. And for skin grafts, a thin layer of skin (similar to what would peel off with a sunburn) is taken from the donors back where it will not be noticeable.
4. "Celebrities always get organs quicker than everybody else. I want to make sure that my organs go to the person that need them most"
While it may seem that celebs get organs faster, they really don't. It may seem that way because of all the media surrounding their circumstance, but they really don't. The United Network for Organ Sharing (the group in charge of the waiting lists and sending organs to the correct recipient) conducts an internal audit on all celebrities to ensure that their organs were received just like everyone else.
5. "My family will have to pay more to have my organs taken out."
Untrue! Any procedure (including tests) that relates to the possibility of organ transplant is paid for by either the hospital or the transplant recipient.
* info found on mayoclinic.com

The second way I am going to try to sway you into donation is to appeal to your emotions so here goes:
I would have been dead 7 years ago if it were not for organ donation. I had been put on the "heart-lung bypass machine". Once you are one that, you have about 10 days to 2 weeks to live because after that time, the machine can cause you to get horrible, untreatable infections. 24 hours after that, I was in surgery. I believe in God's hand in everything, but I know that I would not be here if my donor's family decided not to donate his organs. I have known one family who lost their young son to the bypass machine. I have lost a friend because she was waiting for a lung transplant. I have read horrible accounts from people with Cystic Fibrosis waiting for a transplant, being in constant pain, gasping for air, hospitalized for months, close to years, waiting for their new lungs and a second chance at life. Everytime you go for a jog, or run towards the street to grab your child out of harms way, think of all the people who are waiting for lungs so they could do that along with simple things such as climbing a flight of stairs or doing the laundry. Everytime you eat an ice cream cone, think of the person who was born with diabetes and has had to test their sugar and give themselves shots numerous times a day for their whole lives and are now waiting for a pancreas transplant. And everytime you get up and go to work, think of all the people who wish they could do that, but are too sick or tired to keep a full time job and are now waiting for hearts, livers, and kidneys. And I don't say that to make you feel guilty, but if you are not an organ donor, think over your decision long and hard, remembering these people. And like they say "Don't take your organs to heaven, heaven knows we need them here".