Each organ donation story is one of both heartbreak and hope.

Shawana Mitchell and her fiancé, Joe Hedges, were regulars at Circleville’s VFW lodge poker nights, and, as they often did, joined the card-playing crowd one Friday evening in March 2021 with their friend Troy Fletcher.

They were having fun, joking and trash-talking, when suddenly Joe stood up, telling Troy that his chest hurt.

Joe went to Shawana and told her. Thinking “heart attack,” Shawana urged Joe to sit down and headed to the bar for aspirin. Joe started to follow her through the doors that led to the bar, and Troy, seeing Joe begin to fall, caught him in his arms.

Joe said something Troy couldn’t understand. His lips were blue.

The emergency squad arrived, and Joe was taken to Circleville’s Berger Hospital, then flown to Riverside Methodist in Columbus for emergency surgery.

Joe, 52, had suffered an aortic dissection, a tear in the inner layer of the body’s main artery. When Shawana saw him after surgery, his color had improved and she dared to hope. But brain swelling ensued, and Sunday morning, Joe’s family was called to the hospital.

As they got the devastating news, they were introduced to a representative from Lifeline of Ohio, an independent nonprofit organization that promotes and coordinates organ donations in the state. After hearing about the widespread need, Shawana and the family decided Joe would become an organ donor.

That need, it turned out, was closer than they knew. Unbeknownst to them, Troy was on a waiting list for a kidney transplant. When they found out, the family decided immediately to donate Joe’s kidney to Troy.

Of course, it’s not that simple, says Jessica Peterson, supervisor of media and public relations at Lifeline of Ohio. Donors and recipients must have compatible blood and tissue, just for starters, and for a selected organ recipient to match the donor is extremely rare. In Peterson’s nine years at Lifeline, she says she knew of only one successful directed donation.

But Joe and Troy were a perfect match. Four days after Joe collapsed, Troy was at the Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center to receive his friend’s kidney.

This month, March 2023, is the anniversary of Joe’s sudden death and Troy’s gift of life. Troy, now 40, remains on a waiting list for a pancreas, but he’s feeling healthy and well. “I’ve not had a lick of trouble,” he says. Before receiving Joe’s kidney, Troy says, “I was ready to die. It’s changed my life drastically. I knew God had a plan, and now I really know.”

Troy acknowledges some survivor’s guilt. His friend died, while he’s enjoying better health. In gratitude, Troy said, he and Shawana, 42, are registered organ donors, though Troy laughs about his donation prospects. “If someone wants these terrible eyes, they can have them,” he says.

And there’s a happier end to the story as well. The shared grief over Joe’s death, the several interviews Shawana and Troy have given together, and Troy’s determination to take care of Shawana pulled them together and resulted in another gift: Shawana and Troy are a couple now. “My goal,” he says, “was to make sure she was laughing every day.”