Phyllis

Well, the one year mark from the donation came and went. I sent Lee my info out right away but considering the lag between NMDP and such, I assumed I wouldn't hear much for a while. To my surprise, within a couple days I received an email directly from my recipient! Her name is Phyllis and she lives almost completely on the other side of the country. We have been emailing back and forth since then and it has been such an awesome experience. I look forward to hearing from her and always smile when I see an email from her pop up in my inbox.

She's doing well and I've even gotten to speak with some of her family members too. She's an amazing woman and I so look forward to getting to meet her and her family and finally give her the hug I've been holding onto for her for over a year now. 

I cannot believe how much things have changed in over a year. I looked back at some of my older posts and was reminded to keep counting my blessings. 

Almost 1 Year Since the Donation!

Throughout this past year, my recipient and I have been able to correspond through letters that pass through NMDP to ensure anonymity. I have received letters from her husband, sister, mother, and son and I get so excited when I hear from her and her family. I just received a couple of letters last week that had been written back in September (there's about a month lag with sending it through NMDP and all).

But now, in exactly 10 days, it will have been 1 year since the donation and we will be allowed to release our contact information and correspond without going through NMDP. I've been counting down the days for a long time but since November started, I've been unable to contain my excitement!

Leukemia Free!

I received a card from my recipient midway through last month. She wrote me to let me know that at her 6 month check up she was still leukemia free! Amazing news! She wrote the letter in mid July so I've come to learn that it takes about a month for it get from her all the way to me.

At this point, it's been almost 10 months since the donation and I get more and more excited knowing that come November, we will no longer need NMDP to correspond.

Almost there!

Hello all,

No news lately but I'd assume that all is going well. I realized yesterday that we are midway through July which means we're 8 months in and only 4 more until the 1 year mark!

I hope everyone is enjoying their summer and getting some time to relax!

More Letters!

A couple days ago, I received an email from Lee with a letter attached from my recipients sister. It was such a beautiful letter... she told me how beautiful her sister is, inside and out and how her sister is such an amazing person full of love, laughter, generosity and strength - pretty much exactly how I pictured her.

It warms my heart when I hear from them. :)

Wonderful News!

A little over a week ago I received a letter from my recipient saying that she's doing really well. She was released from the transplant facility before day 100 and actually could have gone home sooner than she did but her family was sick so they didn't want to risk it. She also said she was looking forward to meeting me and being able to hug me and thank me in person.

As everyone can imagine, I was so excited to get this letter - it truly means the world to me and I'm eagerly counting down until the 1 year mark in November :)

Connections

My recipient had been on my mind all night Saturday night. I sometimes wonder why she weighs so heavily on me at times and then think that maybe it's because she's thinking of me too and our thoughts are connecting. Days will pass and life gets busy and the donation doesn't even cross my mind but then some days I can't think of anything else and I'm amazed all over again at how blessed I am to have been able to be part of such an awesome thing. I wonder about her often and I wish I knew how she was doing. I haven't received an update so I'm going to assume that no news is good news.

Do something amazing today :)

Precious Time

Time has so quickly escaped me. I've been experiencing my own personal struggles lately and have let the stress of life grab ahold of me and bring me down.

Unfortunately, I do not have any more updates on my recipient, but I did realize that it has been more than 100 days since the donation and those were the most critical days. I hope everything is going well for her and her family. I will post an update as soon as I get one.