Donor families

On the shoulders of heroes….

All of us who participate and, importantly, contribute to this website do so standing on the shoulders of heroes – the Donors. They saw their lives as an extension of that of their fellow humans, and made to them the noblest of gestures – the gift of life.

Receiving a donated organ is a source of joy and new life for the recipient, but this emotion is inescapably tempered with sadness as it so often involves the death of a fellow human being. Many bereaved families, however, who have suffered profound loss in these circumstances, have also discovered healing consolation.

Donating an organ, whether through the wish of the person who has died, as a bereaved relative or as a living donor related to the recipient, is a unique example of the human capacity to love. Through organ donation, strangers suffering their separate sorrows of death and illness, share their sufferings and make to each other the gift of love and life.

This website recognises the generosity of the donors and their loved ones, not as something static but as an opportunity to continue in their name the good they initiated and use it as a source of inspiration in our own lives to further the cause of humanity. Read the stories of some donor families: take some consolation or inspiration from these stories.

 Regularly the media carries many tragic, yet uplifting stories of how families cope with life following the death of a loved one, a family member who in death continues to give love and life to others.  Their stories give great comfort and inspiration, and as we all are the architects of this website, we welcome and invite you to contribute writings in email on your own personal story, your experience of donation, of coping, of life after donation. Please email us your contribution.