officially a donor

Yesterday, I donated bone marrow to a newborn with a rare blood immunodeficiency. I'm still pretty overwhelmed by the whole experience. I'm in awe that somewhere in the world is a tiny little boy who is fighting to live - and he has my DNA inside his body to help him now. There's a tough little mini-me out there, and all I want him to do is live.

The procedure wasn't painful - minus the sore throat left over from the anesthesiologist's breathing tube, and the pretty intense constipation - I was asleep for the whole thing, which took less than an hour. I am drowsy from the painkillers, and sore. I feel like I fell down a flight of icy stairs and bruised my butt and lower back.

I despise IVs more than anything else I've ever encountered.

One of my kids gave me a card and made me promise not to open it until after the procedure :)

Awake, but still heavily anesthetized, on morphine, and very confused by "KGC." This is also the most unattractive photo ever taken of me, so of course I had to include it here.

And I would absolutely do it again.

I can't run for two weeks while I recover. The doctor says that any kind of over-exertion too soon will cause the puncture holes in my pelvic bone to "connect the dots" and cause a fracture. So I'm counting down the days until I can put my Asics back on, and focusing my energy on fundraising while I wait.

I'm also praying. I'm not huge on prayer, because I'm not convinced God cares about what happens to us. But just in case It does, I want to give my patient, my Little Man, the best chance he can possibly have to survive and thrive. So it'd be nice if you'd pray for him, too.