Bone Marrow Donation

So I had planned to actually do a whole video on this when I did it and post it, but I'm not doing that because I decided I needed to turn the donation in and be done with it. I decided to put my tissue in the Marrow registry for a few reasons. My friend Emily had donated once and ended up saving a guy's life. Then at the end of November, Emily and her family found out that her 18 month old nephew, Gabe, had leukemia. I knew that chances were next to nil that I would be a match to Gabe because matches are closely related to ethnicity and Gabe is half-Jewish, but I wanted to make the effort for all the other children and adults out there that can be saved by donating bone marrow or white blood cells.

Unfortunately I found out today that Gabe died on Wednesday due to complications from his Leukemia. I will be going to his funeral on Sunday which would have been his 2nd birthday. Emily lives with Gabe's Mom and Dad (Randee and Jim) and their other son, 5 year old Jack and has helped raise the boys for the last year and a half since she moved back to Chicago from Washington D.C. They had been in the midst of making plans to move downtown near the Children's Memorial hospital for further treatments for Gabe. I've listened to Emily tell me about all the treatments that Gabe went through and the huge sacrifices that his family (including Emily) made to try and save his life. So in honor of Gabe Donovan and his family I'd like to encourage you all to sign up to be a bone marrow donor. This is a picture of Gabe and his Auntie Emily making brownies at home.

I signed up a couple of weeks ago by getting onto http://www.marrow.org/and going through their online registration. It essentially asked me a whole bunch of health related questions similar to what you are asked when you donate blood and then once it decided I was a viable candidate put me through to the next step, tissue typing. In order to type the tissue the Bone Marrow registry requested a donation of me to cover the costs. It was $52.50. In cases like Gabe's, the family may cover the costs for candidates that they think may be a match, or for rare ethnicities sometimes there are grants to cover it, but in my case I chose to make the donation myself.

I received the tissue typing kit in the mail 3 days later. It has a return envelope, 4 cotton swabs, some bar-coded stickers, and a little kit to put the cotton swabs in once you're finished. You take the sterile swab out one at a time and use each swab for one quadrant of your mouth. For instance, you swab the upper right cheek, lower right cheek, etc. You just run the swab over your cheek for 10 seconds like you are brushing your teeth. Then you put it back in the envelope, seal it, and mail it. After about 6 weeks they send you a card that has your tissue type on it.

If you are selected as a donor you undergo further testing to make sure that you are a match and are healthy. You can match as a marrow donor or just a white blood cell donor (which my friend Anne's father does). After that it's up to you whether or not to donate, but knowing it may save someone's life, I think it would be worth the inconvenience and pain. So, I'm just asking that you consider becoming a marrow donor and also please keep Gabe, Randee, Jim, Jack, Emily, and the rest of their family in your prayers.