Kathleen had been looking forward to joining her husband in retirement soon, with plans to travel together. But for the past couple of years, she hadn’t felt well, and despite test after test, there were no clear answers.
In September 2021, her bloodwork appeared normal. Within months, however, she grew increasingly tired, her body became swollen, and her skin turned yellow. Before the end of the year, Kathleen was hospitalized with end-stage liver and kidney failure.
She was put on dialysis and spent eight weeks in the hospital. That’s when she learned a transplant was her only chance at survival—and there was no guarantee she would live long enough to receive one.
Kathleen was stunned. It wasn’t just fear that followed, but a sudden awareness of time and everything she might miss—the milestones she had always assumed she would be there for, like seeing her daughters graduate from university and watching them build families of their own. She began to mourn a life she thought would keep unfolding.
Despite being too sick to leave her bed most days, Kathleen and her husband held onto hope, making lists of the places they still dreamed of visiting one day. In reality, the only trips she could manage were to and from the hospital for dialysis. Then, in March 2023, everything changed—Kathleen received the gift that would save her life: a liver and kidney transplant from a single donor.
Today, Kathleen sees life differently. “Every day feels like a gift,” she says. “I try to live with purpose and to honour the hero who saved my life.”
Kathleen is here today because of countless blood transfusions, dialysis treatments, and the stranger who made the decision to become an organ donor. She never forgets that and makes a point of thanking donors and donor families whenever she can. “Without them,” she says, “transplant recipients don’t have a story.” Organ donation doesn’t just save one life—it restores families. The impact ripples far beyond a single person.
Since her transplant, Kathleen calls each day a “bonus day”—days she was never promised. She has now lived more than 1,100 of them, using that time to give back, pay it forward, and make meaningful memories.
“My bonus days mean someone else has gone without their loved one for just as long,” she reflects. “There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t think about my donor and their family. Every holiday I spend with my loved ones, I’m aware that another family is missing someone special.”
With the support of family, friends, faith, and a determination she didn’t know she had, Kathleen keeps pushing herself forward—sometimes literally. Before her transplant, she had a hospital bed in her living room because she couldn’t climb the 14 steps to her bedroom. After her transplant, she climbed all 1,776 steps of Toronto’s C.N. Tower—a full-circle moment.
She’s also embraced life with a new sense of adventure—travel, sunrise hikes, skydiving, and ziplining. She jokes that her newfound love of spicy food might be her donor shining through. “I feel like I’m living for two,” she says.
Kathleen now dedicates her life to advocating for organ and tissue donation and supporting donor families and recipients through her work with the Canadian Transplant Association. “The recipient community feels like family,” she says. “We connect instantly. We understand each other.”
Kathleen says she’ll never take another sunrise for granted. Every single one is proof of a second chance—and of a decision that changed everything.
Most of all, she is grateful for the moments she once feared she’d miss—like cheering at her daughter’s university graduation, even when parents were asked to hold their applause. “I couldn’t help myself,” she smiles. “I wasn’t supposed to clap—but I cheered.”