Despite holding the presidency of the student council and being voted most likely to succeed, 16-year-old Shawn Moyer had his prom night invitation declined.
Moyer needed a backup, and though he didn’t know it at the time, the young lady with ringlet curls and an ear-to-ear smile he found would end up saving his life 35 years later with a kidney donation.
Key to this remarkable story is the University of Pennsylvania Medical Center’s (UPMC) innovative “paired exchange program.” Let’s say you want to donate a kidney to a friend, but the two of you don’t genetically match. The program will match your kidney with someone in need, and in return bump your friend up to the top of the waiting list.
Well, 35 years ago, Moyer invited Elena Hershey to the Dallastown Area High School senior prom, a decision that would change his life.
“He needed a backup,” recalled Hershey, a younger girl whom Moyer remembered as “smart,” “pretty,” and a “remarkably nice person.” “And, you know, of course, I would love an invite to a prom. What girl wouldn’t? So I was happy to go.”
As a junior, she was only able to attend prom if directly invited by a senior, which Moyer’s arm facilitated. Not even a full year had passed after the lovely night that the two, as is so often the case, drifted out of touch.
But they first met because of interlinked friends and siblings, which, 35 years later, intertwined their lives yet again.
Hershey’s friend Julie is married to one of Moyer’s friends, and word reached her that her prom date was stuck on dialysis waiting for a new kidney, something which he had already received twice in his life, once when he was 16, and again at 36.
As it happened, Hershey, a serious health and wellness disciple, was already considering a blind kidney donation and felt Moyer was as good a person as any to offer it to.
“A few weeks of having to rest and a few days of discomfort to extend someone’s life or save someone’s life?” Hershey told ABC News 27. “It really is kind of a no-brainer.”
But while they made a clever match on prom night, they were not eligible to share organs, so Hershey and Moyer started the paired exchange process, wherein Hershey’s kidney would go to someone in need, and Moyer would receive another as soon as it was made available.
When a donor had been found, Moyer’s first response was to call Hershey.
“He texted me [the news], and I saw it, and I caught my breath a little bit, and I started to cry a little bit,” said Hershey.
Having the opportunity to speak to the media about her decision, Hershey felt she had to emphasize how little the loss has affected her lifestyle. She was driving again in three days, and back on her stationary bike doing the intense cardio she diligently pursues within a month.
WATCH the story below from ABC…
SHARE This Story Of Two Individuals That Fate Continues To Inmesh Together…
