Hope is the Thing with Feathers

I wanted to wait this time, not preempt a a Good News story before it was fully hatched.

Cassandra's received her liver transplant Thursday evening. Surgery finished up before the sun rose Friday.

No sooner had her parents returned to Philly, exhausted, thoroughly bummed out, that they got the phone call.

Another liver was available, a five-year old donor.

There's tragedy mixed with this miracle, of course, because another child died, a little boy, in order to provide this spectacular gift. For Cassandra, a pediatric transplant is the next best thing to a living donor.

The surgeons were very happy. Not only did the surgery proceed without a hitch but Cassandra had clean margins (no evidence of cancer) around the liver or lungs. Not anywhere.

The journey isn't done. Cassandra is in a medically-induced coma until Monday to give her body a chance to rest and heal. Weirdly enough, physicians did the same thing to her father after his traumatic brain injury 20+ years ago. She'll be closely monitored for infection and rejection or any other mishap.

I am completely humbled by the donor family. I raised little boys, can easily remember them at age five. I'm not sure I would have had the strength or grace to offer my child's organs while steeped in profound grief.

But this family did.

My daughter-in-law is committed to remembering this little boy as if he were one of our own. He'll be part of Cassandra and the rest of us, another child to cherish and remember.