Born Three Times

They say your whole life flashes before you when you are facing death, but I couldn’t remember anything about the past— I was only praying for a future.
“This is Debbie, your transplant coordinator. We think we found a donor liver. We need you at the hospital in two hours.”
“What did you say?” I shouted into the phone. I had been led to believe by my team of doctors that it would be much longer before my name would rise to the top of the transplant list. I often doubted that this day would come and wondered if I had used up my allotment of second chances.
“We think we found a match.” Debbie calmly explained. “And remember we need you to come in fasting, so we can prep you for surgery.”
That phone call abruptly changed my routine Wednesday afternoon into a frantic race for time. An adrenaline rush kicked my sluggish mind and body into high gear. “Dear God, help me,” I said aloud. Since I was alone, no one else heard my plea.
I needed to find Charles, my husband, who was attending a meeting somewhere in the plant at Lockheed Martin Aerospace Company. God answered my prayer when the name of the project engineer he was seeing suddenly popped into my mind. About that same time the doorbell rang, announcing my friend Marianne, who said earlier she might come for a visit that afternoon. She hugged me and bounced with joy when I told her the news. I wished I could have shared her enthusiasm but I was too nervous and scared.
Somehow we managed to get a message through to Charles and call my other family members and pastor. Marianne threw some personal items into my suitcase, put away the food I was preparing for supper, and had me ready to go when Charles came through the door.
My heart pounded and my stomach churned as we drove to Emory University Hospital. Afternoon rush-hour traffic was building as we made our way onto the perimeter around Atlanta. My anxiety level rose further as cars and eighteen-wheelers slowed to a crawl. The thought that this might be my last ride entered my mind.
Debbie greeted me with a hug and smile as I walked through the double doors into the hospital lobby. I tried to smile back at her, but all I really wanted to do was cry. She escorted us to admissions where I signed a stack of paperwork, and then to the lab for blood work, an EKG, and other essential tests to see if I was still healthy enough for the arduous surgery. After my medical workup, my husband and I settled into my room on the pre transplant floor of the hospital, nervously waiting for what tomorrow would bring.
“Mrs. Dixon, do you realize that once we remove your diseased liver you will die unless we successfully graft in a new organ?” the transplant doctor asked me later that evening.
“What other choices do I have?” I tried to joke as I signed the document granting permission for what would be life-ending or life-giving surgery.
My married sons, Stuart and Michael, arrived before midnight and settled into the uncomfortable chairs in my private room. Everyone dozed only to be jarred awake by the deafening sound of a helicopter and its bright flashing lights outside my sixth story window. The clock read 3:00 am.
“Maybe that’s my new liver,.” I said aloud, but also as a prayer.
I lay in my bed listening to my heart beat in rhythm with the ticking of the wall clock. Were these the last minutes of my life? The mild snoring of my husband and sons was irritating. How can they sleep at a time like this? To take my mind off myself, I thought about the unnamed family who made a courageous decision to donate their loved one’s organs while dealing with personal grief. I prayed for my donor family and all the other patients in the hospital. War correspondent Ernie Pyle is often credited with saying, “There are no atheists in foxholes.” I doubted there were many atheists on the pre-transplant floor on May 12, 1998 either.
During those early morning hours while my family drifted in and out of sleep, I reflected on my 54 years of life and the difficult journey that brought me to this watershed moment. It was always my desire to make a difference in the lives of others and accomplish something worthwhile in the world. However, many of my goals and ambitions from early childhood and young adulthood had been put on the back burner or cut short. I struggled emotionally and spiritually during those years as I tried to make sense of the circumstances of my life. Due to an eighteen year battle with liver disease, my middle adulthood years were the most challenging as I fought to survive physically. Only with a successful liver transplant could I have a second chance at life and the opportunity to enjoy better health.
At 5:00 AM bright overhead lights rudely interrupted my thoughts and awakened my family. The nursing team entered my room. “We’re taking you to surgery,” the RN announced as she injected a brain numbing drug into my IV.
My family followed my gurney to the elevator where I mouthed one final “I love you.” The doors closed and the elevator began a slow descent to the first floor. My chance for a future was sitting in a red and white cooler just beyond the closed double doors of the surgical suite.
My transplant surgeon’s eyes were all I could see of his masked face. “I will see you in recovery,” he optimistically said. The anesthesiologist announced that he was starting my IV drip. As I drifted into unconsciousness, I prayed I would live so I could tell my story about the unseen, divine hand that pushed and pulled me through life—testing, yet encouraging me to keep on keeping on.

Chapter 1
High Falls

My childhood retreat was a secret place accessed only by a rocky path hidden among evergreen and maple trees. There was no marker on the road or any way to know an oasis was there unless a local revealed the path to the falls hidden behind a white steeple church. The falls were wider than high and no one knew how High Falls got its name. The swimming hole at the base of the falls was constantly replenished by the cold water that rushed over the precipice of smooth rock. It was a perfect spot to escape the summer heat. In winter the roaring falls became a trickle before freezing in place like an icy statue. For months it silently endured the bitterly cold and shortened days, patiently waiting for the thaws of spring to set it free from its hibernation.
My hometown in upstate New York boasted one stop sign that marked where two streets intersected. Dairy cows and farm silos outnumbered the people in this small agricultural community. A two-room schoolhouse, Cooper’s Store, and the Wesleyan Methodist Church were prominent features on Main Street. Victorian style houses with wrap-around porches lined the side streets, some lovingly cared for and others allowed to deteriorate to a shabbiness that made you want to move in and fix them up. Maple Street was a fitting name for a street with sidewalks and huge sturdy trees that produced sticky, sweet sap in the spring and glorious yellow and crimson leaves to welcome the fall.
It was on this street in Burke, New York that I was born and lived until I was six years old. Many of my early memories revolve around events in our small gray house at the end of Maple Street. A big porch wrapped around the front door of the house. Large vegetable and flower gardens replaced the grass in the side yards. At the bottom of a steep drop-off behind the house, a brook gurgled its way over stones and stumps. The school, church, post office, general store, and my grandparents’ house were all within walking distance. In that rural village my character would be shaped and my personality formed.