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Mary Shelley:National Marrow Awareness Month
It was March 1997 when Mary started experiencing abdominal pain. At first, doctors thought a gall bladder attack was causing the pain. But blood tests revealed something much more serious, a high number of white blood cells in her body. Doctors soon diagnosed Mary with Chronic Mylogenous Leukemia (CML), a malignant blood disorder. Mary immediately began treatment to keep the disease under control. But her best hope for survival would be a marrow transplant. Because Mary has nine brothers and sisters, she and her doctors were optimistic a marrow match could be found in Mary's own family. While 7 siblings matched each other, no one proved to be a match for Mary. That's when she turned to the National Marrow Donor Program® Registry. Her formal search began in January 1998. On March 31, Mary found a donor that matched her perfectly. "It was probably one of the happiest days for me. I was crying. I was so excited, I just started screaming 'They found a match, they found a match.'" Mary received her marrow transplant at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, Washington on June 4, 1998. A courier delivered the healthy marrow along with a letter from the donor's mother. The letter read: "I hope this helps you and gives you what you need to enjoy a full, happy life." Mary remembers "When the courier delivered the marrow, he and the nurses were singing 'Happy Birthday' to me." Now, more than one year post transplant, Mary looks forward to meeting her life-saving marrow donor. She remarks at the kindness of the person who gave her a second chance at life. "I continue to be amazed by the human spirit. The kind things people do for one another is simply incredible."
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Talk with Mary Shelley for just five minutes and you will know she is thankful for every day of life. Not a day goes by when she doesn't think about a 23-year-old man in Tennessee. He is the man who donated his marrow almost 2 years ago so Mary could fight the leukemia that threatened her life. "My marrow transplant marked a new part of my life, it gave me the hope for a second chance at life." Being a registered nurse in the labor/delivery unit of a Baltimore hospital, Mary helps bring life into the world each day. Now, her own life would depend on someone else; someone who could deliver the gift of life.
