If you saw a little girl in the middle of the road and a car was racing toward her, sure to hit her, and she was oblivious to that fact, would you try to move her out of the way?

If you saw a bunch of people trapped in a burning building, wouldn’t you try to do something to help?

If your own child was sick, wouldn’t you do everything in your power, even if it meant you might risk your own life, to help your child get well?

The majority of people would indeed do things that might even put their own life at risk in order to protect or save the life of another. These are good people… helpful people… modern-day heroes.

Yet, currently, there are over 92,000 people who are dying and on the organ transplant lists – and many of these same modern-day heroes are not nor have ever considered becoming organ donors – something that doesn’t even put their life at risk.

Over 3,700 people are added to the transplant list every month, while only about 2,300 people actually receive transplants each month, suffering with illnesses, pain, discomfort, and poor quality of life while waiting for a transplant – and over 540 people DIE every month waiting for a viable organ donation. Clearly, more people are added to the list every month than are removed from the list – and many removed from the list are only removed because their loved ones are left to mourn their deaths.

The sad fact is – many of those deaths could be prevented – and the quality of thousands of others could be increased by one thing: more organ donations.

Approximately 10,000 people die every day in America….(stats vary every year)

I know this is morbid – but it’s true.

If every one of those 10,000 people who died daily were to be organ donators, you can do the math and see that it would not take long for every person on the organ donation transplant list, which only adds 3,700 people per day, to actually receive a donated organ and have their life-saving surgery.

I realize it is optimistic of me to think every person who dies will be an organ donator, but I’m an optimistic realist.

Of course, there are some people who can’t donate organs, just like some people can’t donate blood, because they have an illness or disorder or take a medication the prevents it – but the majority of people CAN donate organs.

Here’s the thing…

Some organs can be donated while you are still alive – the people who control the organ donation list will only allow this if a person is a VERY close match and the likelihood of rejection is slim, and the risk to the person donating is minimal.

You have to match someone very closely to be considered for a living donation – and you have to be in pretty good health yourself too.

However, have you ever heard the phrase, “You can’t take it with you when you’re gone?”

The same holds true for your organs and body tissue.

Let me go a bit morbid on you. When you are buried, you will be drained of your blood anyway, so why not donate it to someone whose life might be saved from it? Plasma is the same – you’re going to lose that anyway.

Many people think that if you donate your organs that you have to donate your entire body, but this is not true. You can actually choose what organs you want to donate and which ones you don’t, but your body itself is not donated unless you choose to donate your entire body to medical science, which is what I intend to do, since I can’t be an organ donator.

Organ donors can have full funerals with open caskets if they choose – the process of donating organs doesn’t change the appearance of your body at all, and your loved ones will never know by looking that there was organ and tissue donations.

Donations include:

• Kidney
• Heart
• Liver
• Lung
• Pancreas
• Intestines
• Cornea
• Skin
• Bone
• Bone marrow
• Blood & Plasma

And here is the part that really gets to me – one organ donator can help as many as 50 people who are sick! 50 PEOPLE!

If you donate your organs, you can save lives, give someone back their quality of life, help someone see again, keep a family from having to grieve the loss of a loved one… there’s so much that donating organs can do, and quite frankly, it’s not like you need them when you’re dead anyway!

I know, I have a bit of a practical sense where death is concerned. In the Tao, everything has a balance, and we are all one, interconnected, each a part of the other. When one of us dies, we are all diminished. So saving the life of one person actually makes the world itself a better place overall, but I’m sure it means the most to the one who is saved.

Whatever your faith – whatever your belief – or no faith or belief whatsoever – I don’t know many people out there who, if given the chance to save someone’s life without risking their own at all (since they’d already be dead) wouldn’t do that.

It doesn’t cost you or your family anything to donate your organs – not a penny. It won’t hold up having a funeral, it won’t change much of anything about what has to happen after you die. The ONLY major difference is that you will be responsible for saving lives that might otherwise die without your thoughtful donation, and your family can live with the comfort of knowing that your death, while sad and tragic no matter the circumstances, had a positive benefit to it.

You don’t have to be young to donate, you don’t have to be old – anyone, no matter the age, can donate organs – even babies, even the elderly. Anyone under 18 requires their parent’s permission though.

Signing an organ donation form is not enough!

It’s great to sign an organ donation form, and great to have the fact you’re an organ donor on your driver’s license (most states do this), but it’s not enough. Your family needs to know this – any time you check into the hospital, the staff needs to know this, you have to talk to people. It could be quite a shock to your husband or wife if you were to ever die and then the hospital staff comes to talk to them about harvesting your organs – and they knew nothing about it!

Plus, in the event of an untimely and unplanned death, there may not be time to notice or check for your donation status, which requires the staff to follow a different procedure after your death in order to save other people’s lives.

I URGE you, I BEG you – please, please consider donating organs and blood and plasma – I have a personal reason for wishing everyone to do this. If I can convince one person to become an organ donator, I have saved lives too, and the more organs donated, the higher up the list people at the bottom of the organ transplant list will move… who knows, one day, my convincing people to donate organs might just end up saving my own life.

I’ve become something of an expert on this topic – if you have questions, ASK ME, I’ll answer… whatever it takes to convince you to become an organ and tissue donor – I will do it!

If you are an organ donor already, thank you! Make sure your family and friends know about your desire to save lives after your death!

If you are not an organ donor, please think about it, ask questions, feel comfortable with it, and then go to any of these sites for more information:

U.S.Department of Health and Human Services Organ Donation Initiative
www.organdonor.gov

United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS)
www.unos.org

Coalition on Donation
www.donatelife.net

Children’s Organ Transplant Association
www.cota.org

And if you decide you want to become an organ donor, you can go here:

http://www.organdonor.gov/donor/registry.shtm

And select your state to learn how to register to become a donor. It takes very little time or effort, and the benefit is immeasurable.

Thank you for listening – thank you for considering – and for those who register – thank you for saving lives!

I’m off my soapbox now – you guys have a great day!

Love and stuff,
Michy