I recently learned that my stake (a group of local church congregations) will be holding a blood drive on August 27th. You may remember (or perhaps not) that August 27th is Kendall’s birthday, as well as the day we began our cancer journey last year. My feelings about blood have certainly changed after our experiences of the past year. So much of our days were spent monitoring and worrying about and treating issues with Kendall’s blood. Over his seven month battle with leukemia, Kendall received EMORMOUS amounts of blood, platelets, plasma, IVIG, and other blood products. During his hospitalizations, particularly his five weeks in the ICU, Kendall often needed daily infusions of various blood products, just to stay alive. Sometimes they were even needed multiple times within the same day as his veno occlusive disease literally ate his body’s platelets, and he was losing a great deal of blood with internal and other uncontrolled bleeding. And all while we were in the midst of a pandemic-induced national blood shortage. Blood levels are still critically low.
I am unfortunately not eligible to donate blood. But I do plan on volunteering at the blood drive that day to help in other ways in Kendall’s memory. For those who read these updates and have followed our story, will you join me? If you are able, would you consider donating blood on or around August 27th, in honor of Kendall? If so, it would mean a lot if you would send me a line to let me know that you participated in some way. I love the idea of Kendall and his experiences still being able to help others.