When we were in the Ronald McDonald Family Waiting Room at Shands, things were a bit tense for us. My husband and I fielded phone calls from distant family members and friends. Our daughter was going crazy, being cooped up inside. My parents were sick of Maxwell House and PBS Sprout on the waiting room's HDTV. We'd been told that Elijah's surgery would take 4-6 hours. We were only 2 hours in.
Suddenly, a family burst through the doors. There were, maybe, eight of them. The women were crying, the men were stalwart. My husband is a Middle School Youth Minister by title, but he feels called to minister to everyone. He approached the woman crying the most intensely and he said, "Can I help? Can I pray with you?"
She grabbed him by the hands and began to tell her story. Her son had been shot by his cousin; ages 14 and 18, respectively. Today was the day after Mother's Day, and she was afraid her son was going to die. My husband prayed with her and her family. They were secluded in a room when the surgeon came in to tell us that Elijah was doing really well and that his surgery was successful, shorter than expected.
We were elated.
We forgot about the other family in our joy.
Elijah was wheeled into his PICU room. One by one, we brought in my parents and Grammy. We spent a long time in there with our daughter. She had so many questions about her brother, and she was so concerned and so loving. She wanted us to hold her over his drugged-out body so she could hold his hand and stroke his face.
I was so content. Elijah survived surgery! That meant he would finally thrive! I was at peace.
I held my husband's hand while he held our daughter and she had her arm around my neck. We were finally a healthy family for the first time.
Elijah wasn't going to be able to nurse for a couple of days, so I had to pump breastmilk in the meantime. There was a room provided for mothers of PICU babies who needed to pump. It was a sweet room, too! Three couches, four Medela hook-ups, radios with headphones, no overhead lighting (lamps with dimmable bulbs), blankets, and its own thermostat. Absolutely perfect.
I settled down to pump for the first time post-surgery while reading a book.
The door opened and the mother and aunt of the boy that was shot entered the room. I apologized and asked if they wanted me to leave.
"No," the mother said. "I need all the support I can get."
I continued to pump while we chatted briefly about children and faith.
A social worker came in. She looked doubtfully at me. The mother said, "She's practically family now. She can stay," speaking about me.
What happened next made me cry, and nothing about Elijah had made me cry.
The mother, the aunt, and the social worker were talking about the son's body.
He wasn't going to make it. His brain was dead, his spine was shattered. His kidneys, however, were perfect. And there was a girl in the hospital who was having kidney failure Right This Minute. She needed a transplant.
The mother of the 14 year old boy who'd been shot... she looked up at the ceiling. She clasped her hands to her breast. Then she reached her left hand out to my right. I took it.
She looked at the social worker.
"Take it all," she said.
"When my son was born, I prayed that God would use him to save others. I was hoping He'd make him a Pastor. But now I see that He wants to use his body to save others. God gave His Son; I can give mine."
This courageous mother opted to keep her son on life support and farm out his usable organs so that he could save as many lives as possible.
The last time I saw her, she was writing letters to potential future organ recipients, telling them about his family history and how to reach her if they had any questions.
