Anything for a Friend
By Evan Despian, 15
Our friend, Dr. Brian Buckley, was dying and there was nothing we could do about it. Or so we thought. Here’s the story of how my dad made a miracle happen — and how I watched, in awe.
Friends forever
Dr. Buckley and my dad had been really good friends for several years, ever since I became best friends with his son Brendan at Montessori School back in third grade. We connected on the sidelines of a football practice on an extremely hot day in August. I had gotten a little dehydrated and almost passed out. Fortunately, Dr. Buckley was in the stands and when he saw what was happening, he ran onto the field and checked on me. Our families have been connected ever since.
In addition to being a good doctor, one of the things that impressed me about Dr. Buckley was the fact that he also my baseball coach. Actually, he had been a pitcher in college at University of California and later played for the California Angels in the Major Leagues. Sadly, he threw out his arm early in his Major League career. But I was pretty excited that a real professional was going to teach me the game of baseball.
So the entire family was really sad when the Buckley’s moved to North Carolina just before Brendan and I started 6th grade.
Not long after, Dr. Buckley became extremely sick after drinking a bottle of water that had been sitting in a cooler on his porch for several days. He stayed sick for a really long time. Over several months, I would hear my parents talking about how sick he was, and I knew that no one was really sure what the problem was. Everyone had thought that it may have been just a virus and nothing very serious, but we were all wrong.
In the summer of 2009 he was admitted to the hospital and w soon found out that he had a liver disease and needed a liver transplant. Soon after, the Buckley’s moved to Maryland be close to Johns Hopkins Medical Center.
The waiting begins
Dr. Buckley was only getting worse. He started dropping a lot of weight, muscle mass and he was losing energy every day. Just walking the dog was exhausting for him.
Soon after the move they discovered that Georgetown Hospital had a better Hepatology unit, and so they switched hospitals. So at Georgetown University (where ironically Dr. Buckley had graduated Medical School) he was put on a list for a cadaver donor.
It seems so weird to me that they were waiting for someone to die so that Dr. Buckley could live.
Then, after several months, the doctors at Georgetown felt that he was too sick to wait for a cadaver donor. They told him that the only way that he could possibly survive was to find a living donor.
This was someone willing to give half of his or her own liver to save the life of someone in need. It is very difficult to find a living donor for these types of procedures mainly because the donor has to match the patient in almost every category from blood type, liver size, body type and overall health, but they must also be willing to put their own life on the line.
Most people don’t know this but after they have part of their liver removed to donate to someone else (generally about ½ to ¾ of their liver is given to the recipient) their liver and the recipient’s liver actually grows to full size after six months or so. It is the only organ in our bodies that can regenerate itself. But the live donor transplants are still relatively new in the United States, having only been performed for the last 10 years.
In most cases it is an immediate relative that donates their liver. They tend to match well in all the areas, and of course are most willing to help a family member. But after everyone in Brian’s family was screened, there were no matches.
That’s when my dad got on the schedule to be tested.
My mom and dad talked a lot about what being a donor would mean, and the serious and possible risks of the surgery and recovery. But my dad is sort of a man of action.
He went down to Texas to help people for six weeks as a volunteer after Hurricane Katrina. He was the only person who could speak Spanish in his FEMA unit and so people lined up to talk to him and get help with their problems. He still says it was one of the hardest and yet best things he has ever done.
My dad spent two full days doing testing at Georgetown and after a few more days we heard that it was looking like my dad was going to be a good match. He was a similar body type – tall and athletic. The doctors were impressed that he was so healthy and that he worked out a lot. We began to all feel hopeful for a solution. It looked like he was a match.
Then we got a big blow. The doctors decided that it was too dangerous for them to do the surgery because my dad had an extra vein across his liver that they didn’t know how to handle. Our whole family was shocked. When my mom told Dr. Buckley’s wife, Shirley, she burst into tears.
“We will find someone, Shirley,” my mom reassured her. But I think Miss Shirley was beginning to feeling very doubtful.
My mom kept sending people to Georgetown, some friends and people who had read an article in the local paper, but Georgetown didn’t come up with any donor candidates, and the people my parents and the Buckleys referred to them were again and again not a fit. They asked us to stop sending so many people – which we did not understand.
Dr. Buckley was growing sicker and sicker and it was coming down to only months left in his life before his liver would give out. Probably by Christmas of 2009, without a miracle, he would be dead.
Meanwhile my mom and dad and their friends stayed busy focusing on other ways to help the Buckleys, who were now without healthcare coverage. They organized a fundraiser / auction / concert to help pay for the Buckley’s medical bills and for the surgery. After a very successful community fundraiser our family and friends raised more than $25,000, which helped pay for their medical bills. But Dr. Buckley still had no donor.
The Medical College of Virginia to the rescue
Nearly a year after Dr. Buckley was diagnosed, Miss Shirley called my mom to say she had heard that Medical College of Virginia in Richmond was doing successful living donor transplants, more even than Georgetown.
My dad applied again to be a donor, and the doctors there were impressed with what they saw. The surgeon, Dr. Fisher, knew exactly what to do with the extra vein and how to handle the surgery.
Before we knew it the surgery date of October 12, 2009 was here.
I had just started high school and was busy with schoolwork and new friends. I was very excited and scared at the same time. We felt optimistic that Dr. Buckley would be saved, but the surgery was only 80% safe, meaning that there was a 20% chance that things could go wrong during the surgery.
But those numbers seemed so different when they were talking about my dad – 20% chance of a problem, I kept thinking. It was a family decision, and my mom and dad included my brother, sister and I, but in the end it was Dr. Buckley’s life at stake.
The day finally arrived.
I was determined to be there. Brendon, his brother Jason, and I went down to Richmond on Monday morning to wait for the surgery to be over. We also hoped to see our dads.
They took my dad down at 5:00 a.m., and late in the morning they brought Dr. Buckley down to the Operating Room next door to my dad’s to get him ready. At just the right moment they would take ½ of my dad’s liver out and surgically implant it in Dr. Buckley.
The concept of it was so foreign to me. It was a really, really long day and my mom was extremely anxious and on edge. I also felt scared at times – like when the nurse reported that after five hours the doctors had only severed ½ of my father’s liver, and that it would be several hours before they cut through the entire liver.
Hearing this made it so real, and I began to understand what my dad was doing and how brave and scary it must have been for him – especially right before he went into surgery.
The surgery lasted for over 14 hours, with the transplant coordinator giving us updates throughout the very long day, and my mom getting more and more stressed every hour that passed.
Finally, around 8 o’clock at night Dr. Fisher came to talk to us.
We all got extremely quiet. The surgery had been a success and everything had gone perfect, and according to schedule, he said. Both men were doing well.
We all shouted and hugged and high fived. My dad was still very sedated, the doctor told us, and he had experienced a small heart episode during the surgery, but it was under control now.
When my mom and I got to the Post Operative room I saw that he was hooked up to every kind of monitor, tube and drain you can imagine. It was actually pretty scary to see him look like that.
My dad is a big guy, and always on the go, and now he could not move, and could barely talk.
Before I left I hugged him and he said in a kind of whisper – “Basketball tryouts tomorrow?” I nodded and smiled. My mom was teary, but I could tell she was relieved to finally see him after this long day.
My dad spent a week in the hospital and came home unable to move around much for the first few days.
He was home recovering for eight weeks. He had a huge incision that went from one side of his stomach to the other. My mom had to change his bandages and his incision drain and give him shots twice a day so he wouldn’t get a blood clot. Dr. Buckley slowly but steadily improved. It took several weeks for him to get home because it turns out he was much, much sicker than he ever let on.
His liver had shriveled up to 1/4 its original size and he had been barely alive for months. He had lost over 80 pounds and most of the muscle in his body. The doctors were in awe of how he had managed to function for so long, being so sick.
It has been a year since the surgery.
In his last doctor visit the doctors said Dr. Buckley’s liver has completely regenerated. He has also gained back the weight he lost, and is practicing medicine again.
My dad is doing great, too. He is working out again and in good health. In September Dr. Buckley took my dad on a celebration trip to Spain (my father’s homeland) to see my dad’s family. My father often jokes that Dr. Buckley is now officially Spanish – so it was only fitting that he get to meet the family.
I think back to the first time I saw Brendan walk into my third grade class, and I thought we might be friends. Little did I know the amazing friendship that our families would share forever.
About Evan Despian
Evan is a 15-year-old sophomore at James Monroe High School in Fredericksburg, VA, where he plays basketball and is a pitcher and shortstop on the Varsity baseball team. He is a drummer and guitar player and loves to spend time with his family, especially his cousins who live in Charlottesville, VA. He is a huge fan of Virginia Tech sports and an avid Redskins fan.