Realizing What is Important

Yesterday was an unusual experience in the plasmapheresis treatment center. As I sat looking about the room at my fellow patients, I found myself becoming unusually introspective.

I am the only kidney transplant patient at present; the others are undergoing some type of cancer treatment. There was a very ill lady in her 70’s who had undergone chemotherapy and now was receiving stem cells, a girl in her 20’s who was donating stem cells to her brother who had leukemia, a rancher from Western Nebraska collecting his own stem cells for a marrow transplant, and a middle age man who was soon to undergo chemo.

All of the patients were accompanied by their wives, husbands, and in the case of the young lady, her boyfriend. Watching the loving concern shown by them was very reaffirming to my faith in humanity. To see the old man covering his wife’s head with a stocking cap, the young man feeding his girl friend, and the other lady bringing cookies from the cafeteria for everyone filled me with a sense of well being.

I snapped out of my reverie and glanced up and saw my wonderful wife Sandy sitting beside me…she looked up from her book and asked if there was anything she could do for me. At that moment, I realized that the tragedy of illness was not in being sick; the true tragedy would be in having no one who cared and loved you.