“Beloved teacher with AML [Acute Myeloid Leukemia] is desperately searching for a bone marrow donor to save her life.” Even though I was sitting down, I could feel my knees buckle just reading those words. I had just marked 18 years since my mother passed away from leukemia after an extensive but fruitless search for her bone marrow match. She had also been “a beloved teacher with AML desperately searching for a bone marrow donor,” but unfortunately we never found a match.�
Though I have stayed in touch with the family at Gift of Life Marrow Registry who helped us run so many drives, and participated in their fundraising and awareness activities, it has been a while since I actually ran a drive of my own. But seeing those words was a wake up call and I felt I had to do more than click and share on Facebook. I reached out to Gift of Life and they enthusiastically brought me back into the bone marrow drive world to run another drive.
A lot has changed since we searched for my mother’s match. For starters, there is no blood required for the test, just a quick cheek swab. In addition, should someone be chosen as a match, the transplant process is much less invasive and donors feel much better after donating than with the past methods. Also, the age range of patients who can turn to a bone marrow transplant as treatment has also expanded, and transplants are successfully done on patients who are older than in the past. What hasn’t changed is the need for each person capable of being tested to step up and get swabbed. Whereas blood is matched by type, bone marrow is a genetic match, and blood type does not matter.
Anyone whose life has been touched by the transplant mentality knows the roller coaster of emotions that exists, in a different way than for other cancers or illnesses. There’s a feeling of hopefulness because if there’s a match for the patient, then the cure is out there. But then there’s also a feeling of despair, that feeling of, “How can I possibly reach out to enough people and ensure I find my needle in a haystack?” We know that health and healing lies in the hands of Hashem, so we daven for a refuah sheleima. At the same time we have to do our hishtadlut, and put the effort into helping not just these patients, but future patients who instead of having to lose precious time running drives and searching for donors, can now turn to Gift of Life and find that their match has already been tested and is in the database.
The drive is searching for a match for “Morah Leah” as well as for Roni, a 29 year-old bride-to-be whose wedding was supposed to take place in September but she instead is now undergoing leukemia treatments while waiting to find a match. Both women come from mixed backgrounds. Morah Leah is from a mix of Sephardic and Ashkenazic backgrounds, and Roni is looking for someone primarily from Moroccan, Yemenite or North African origin. Anyone from any background between the ages of 18 and 45 and in general good health is eligible to be screened and join the worldwide registry for patients in need.
Please stop by Congregation Ohr HaTorah, 36 Rector Court in Bergenfield, this Sunday, August 26, between 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. to see if you can be a life-saving match.
Questions? Feel free to e-mail [email protected] or visit www.giftoflife.org.
By Jenny Gans
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