Pick up the slack, Erik--pick up the slack.
Well, there's a New Thing that I haven't done yet, but which I'm planning on doing this week--and I urge you to do it as well.
I'm registering my bone marrow with the National Marrow Donor Program.
Last week, my friend Erica was diagnosed with Acute Lymphocytic Leukemia (ALL). She is currently undergoing aggressive treatments (chemotherapy, etc.) at an excellent hospital. Erica is a fucking awesome person. She's a fighter and she's brave and I believe she's going to get through this, but it's gonna be a long ordeal, and she's gonna need some help.
Her doctors have asked for friends and family to go to their local hospital or Red Cross to see if they might be a match for bone marrow donations. Now, when I heard this, my first thought was that I wanted to do whatever I could to help Erica, and then my second thought was that donating bone marrow sounds kinda scary. I mean, we all know I'm a wussy when it comes to medical things.
But the thing is, after doing some googling (how much do I love google?) I've discovered that becoming a donor isn't very scary at all--actually, it's really simple and painless and easy (and if you don't believe me, well, I've already done your googling for you--just clink on these links)--and there are lots of people in need of your healthy bone marrow (which, after you've donated, replenishes itself in your healthy body fairly quickly). The problem is, even though there are lots of people who need bone marrow, there aren't nearly enough people donating bone marrow.
Let's work on that. For Erica, and for the many many others who need your donations so badly.
Here's how you can become a bone marrow donor:
1. Contact your local National Marrow Donor Program (NMDP) here.
2. Join the registry, which is as easy as filling out some paperwork and providing a small blood sample so that they can determine your tissue type.
3. After you've joined the registry, they will contact you when and if there is a match for your particular "type" and that's when you go in and donate.
You can read all about the donating process here--it really ain't bad at all.
Rock out with your cock out and become a donor.
You could save lives.
*
(P.S. I just noticed that I wrote "clink on these links" instead of "click on these links." How stupid am I? Anyway, since the new me is all about embracing typos rather than editing them, I think that, from now on, instead of saying things like "click on this link" or "click on these links," we should just abbreviate those phrases and say "clink." Which, from now on, will be recognized, on My Year Of New Things, at least, as a directive to check out a hyperlink. Got it? Cool.)
10 comments:
I donated marrow last year, and it was challenging, but very worth it. I blogged it here. Although I had a tough time dealing with the anesthesia, I would do it all again in a heartbeat.
word to all this.
Thanks for putting it out there Erik. I would never have thought about donating, but now you have planted the seed. Nice one:)
Uma, I was going to say something funny or snide to you, but we both know I'm not very funny, and I'm only snide late at night when we're in bed together, or, I should say, when we're in beds (plural) together, since we're never in the same bed together, we're usually in beds next to each other, or on top of each other, rather, I mean, we're not on top of each other (egads!), but the beds are on top of each other, as in they're bunks, but why am I explaining that, you know what I mean, though other people might be like, what the fuck is he talking about, I guess that's why I explained it and said "bunks", and gosh, all of this talk about being snide in beds together makes me want to have a sleepover, and soon, it's been way too long, so, you know, we need to make that happen, and I need to end this sentence, so instead of being funny or snide, I'll just say that I love you too, and I hope you'll give Erica all of my love this weekend while you're in Boston, and don't have too much fun without me, and I promise that the next time you comment on my blog I will reply to your comment much quicker than I did this time.
(How was that?)
Erik, I have been registered with the marrow donor program for awhile. I truly believe that if we were all donors (marrow, blood, organs, etc.) there would be no lists of names of people waiting.
-Lanie
Melanie, I read your blog entries about donating, and I'm glad I did--it sounds like it was much more of a committment than you had anticipated, so it's good to know everything to expect. You did a really good thing. More people should do it. I feel like I'm armed with a lot more knowledge about the whole thing and I look forward to helping out myself. I will let you know how it goes after I've had the chance to donate too.
Jesse,
Word to you. And to your mother.
PS. I don't know if you were with me or not, but do you remember this moment from our past: I have this very clear memory of being in the drama room in high school this one day and Bronwen Bittetti (remember her? is that how you spell her name?) came into the drama room and made this announcement: "I just saw [the movie] Malcolm X and all I can say is WORD."
Gina, it sounds like Lanie knows even more about this than I do, so we can answer all of your questions at Game Night, and plant more seeds and then you'll register and we'll be like a gang of bone marrow donors. Sounds punk, right?
Lanie, I totally agree with you.
Post a Comment