My husband became an organ donor as his final wish \u2014 after he d*ed, his doctor stopped me and said, \u201cThere\u2019s something<\/p>\n
he made me promise to give you only after he was gone.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mark and I had been married for three years when I finally became pregnant with the baby we had always wanted.<\/p>\n
Our happiness lasted only six months.<\/p>\n
Then Mark learned about his illness.<\/p>\n
The doctors gave him no more than three months to live.<\/p>\n
He probably wouldn\u2019t live long enough to meet our daughter.<\/p>\n
That evening, he settled beside me on our porch with one hand resting on my belly.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf my organs are still healthy enough when the time comes, I want them donated.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cPlease don\u2019t talk about dying while she\u2019s kicking,\u201d I whispered.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s exactly why I have to.\u201d<\/p>\n
He looked at my stomach.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf I can\u2019t watch her grow up, maybe I can at least make sure somebody else gets more time with theirs.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mark grew weaker much faster than we expected.<\/p>\n
By my eighth month, I was helping him button his shirts and pretending not to notice when he had to stop halfway to the bathroom just to catch his breath.<\/p>\n
A few weeks before he d*ed, Mark began asking to speak to his doctor alone.<\/p>\n
I never understood why.<\/p>\n
Whenever I asked what they discussed, he would only squeeze my hand and say,<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s something I need to arrange.<\/p>\n
Please trust me.\u201d<\/p>\n
It was unlike him to keep anything from me, especially then.<\/p>\n
But he was strangely firm about it.<\/p>\n
So I let him do it.<\/p>\n
He passed in the hospital with my hand wrapped around his.<\/p>\n
Afterward, I signed the final donation papers with tears dripping onto the page.<\/p>\n
I remembered that Mark wanted this.<\/p>\n
I had to honor his final wish, even though doing so caused me unbearable pain.<\/p>\n
As I was leaving the hospital, his doctor hurried after me, his face pale.<\/p>\n
He was holding something behind his back so I couldn\u2019t see it.<\/p>\n
\u201cWait!<\/p>\n
Please, wait!\u201d<\/p>\n
Something in his voice made me stop.<\/p>\n
\u201cMark gave me this three weeks ago,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was very specific.<\/p>\n
You weren\u2019t supposed to see it while he was alive.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
My husband became an organ donor as his final wish \u2014 after he d*ed, his doctor stopped me and said,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1303,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1302","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mealtips.delicedcook.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1302","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mealtips.delicedcook.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mealtips.delicedcook.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mealtips.delicedcook.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mealtips.delicedcook.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1302"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mealtips.delicedcook.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1302\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1304,"href":"https:\/\/mealtips.delicedcook.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1302\/revisions\/1304"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mealtips.delicedcook.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1303"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mealtips.delicedcook.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1302"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mealtips.delicedcook.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1302"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mealtips.delicedcook.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1302"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}