Organ Donation Chronicle - D Minus 7

I leave for Hartford tomorrow morning. I've done everything I can do here. The final stage is underway.

Part Six - Starting the Countdown

We had set the date, May 14. It was real. We were going to do this. Now the reality of trying to organize my business so that I could maximize my cash in the bank and some how have some momentum for when I came out. I told my associates that from now (January 2008) until the donation was complete that I was going to focus exclusively on earning income and was putting longer term developmental projects on hold. We were in the process of some significant developments with associates having their own challenges and there were lots of questions as to where everything was going to end up. Not exactly a comforting set of thoughts as I’m wondering how we’re going make this all work financially.

Because so much time had elapsed since we had started this process, it was necessary to redo most of the medical tests. Back I went for the dozen test tubes of blood and the 24-hour urine sample. Of course by now I was pro and was non-plussed. Certain tests for tissue sampling and various dread diseases, the hospital in Connecticut wanted to do directly. So in February, I took a trip their.

There was the incident where we found out the hospital had been put on probation and both my sister and I were wondering what we would do. I have a client who consults with hospitals and was able to determine that it was not as dire as it appeared in the press.

Around this time a funny thing happened. It had to do with my motivations. They didn’t get challenged. They expanded. I can’t quite remember how it took place but I was becoming very aware of gratitude and specifically my personal gratitude for so much that had happened to me in my life.

It might not seem this way to some, but I feel I’ve had a charmed life. Any time something bad happened; something else happened to bail me out. When I was in the Army, I was supposed to go to Viet Nam – I had orders to go – but there was a one-letter error on the orders. The clerk could have easily said that it made no difference. Instead she said the orders were faulty and sent them back to Washington where we promptly never heard from them again. I was not the best person when I started my marriage or raising my kids. But my Wife had unlimited patience and waited until I got my act together. I had business failures and made bad spending decisions that were ultimately bailed out by relatives. Just in the last few years I have missed major auto accidents by the tinniest of margins. Never had I been put in a situation where I had to make a conscious decision about putting myself at risk for something that was truly important – like another’s life.

But here it was – that situation where I had in fact been offered the opportunity to make a conscious decision – to decide if I was willing to take the risk to save someone else. It was so clear in my mind at that moment that God was giving me a test. Was I going to take all the good fortune for granted as if I was entitled to it? Or was I going accept that I needed to repay all the good fortune I had received. Was I going to be true to the spiritual principles I had worked on for 25 years? Or when there was a risk to my life, was I going to bail?

For me there was no question. And it filled me with even more confidence that this was what I was supposed to and what I needed to do