Last year I registered with the Unrelated Bone Marrow Donors Registry*, which is part of Canadian Blood Services.
Some people are on the registry forever and never get called. I got called today! Somebody out there somewhere in the world needs my bone marrow! I might get a chance to save a stranger’s life…not just ANY stranger, but a stranger who is freakishly similar to me.
Tomorrow I’ll be having a 30-minute medical-history interview…if I pass that step, I move to the next one.
*The Registry contributes to an international database of potential bone marrow donors and the people who need bone marrow. The object is to get as many potential donors tested and into the database as possible, so that when someone needs bone marrow, a match can be found. (Bone marrow matches are statistically much rarer than blood type matches, and the likelihood of two unrelated people matching is pretty low….that’s why they need so many people to sign up and get typed.)
You are such an amazing woman, Zoom!
I really hope you can help this stranger.
Thanks Dakota! I hope so too…I love the way fate can pull people together into some weird web of random connectivity.
When I signed up for the bone marrow donor program – it must be 13 years ago now – they had us watch a video of how they got the marrow out. Ouch! I still signed up figuring maybe they could suck out a little fat from back there while they were at it.
Then I lived in the UK in 1995-6 and now I am deferred from giving blood because I might have mad cow. Grr. I had given 77 pints before the deferral too. I figure as long as I can say bovine spongiform encephalopathy, I don’t have it. I am keeping an eye on how the tests are going for prions for BSE but to date, they still have to biopsy your brain to find out if you have it and I think I’ll pass for now. I am pleased to know that someone actually got called.