She walked away from the grave where she buried her daughter just a few weeks ago, but then she noticed something strange. A little boy passed her and made his way to her grave. What was he doing? The little boy smiled at her as he passed. She didn’t want to overthink things, but then she saw something that stirred a reaction deep within her.
The McRae family thought everything would always be perfect, but things would take a dark turn one day when their daughter, who’d recently turned 18, was in a tragic accident. Tammy broke down when she heard the news about her daughter. Things were going so well, and now her entire world was crashing down around her. Things would never be the same.
Tammy married Chester right out of high school. The two had eyes for each other junior year, and by their senior year, they were together. By college, the two had their daughter Lindsay and were also engaged. To make things even better, they had an amazing wedding that felt out of a children’s fairy tale. The three of them were so happy. Lindsay even got to lead the procession, and her parents could not have been prouder.
After many years, Lindsay had grown into a beautiful young adult. Her parents were so happy with the woman she had become. She got great grades at school and always brought as much joy as she could to everyone she met. Apart from having a great daughter in Lindsay, Tammy and Chester also had a great house and stable jobs. But one day, it would all come crashing down.
Their family was perfect—they had a great daughter, amazing jobs, and even a nice tidy house in the suburbs. But they had no idea what was to come. To understand what happened and why the boy was so significant, let’s talk more about Lindsay.
As she grew up, Lindsay was the girl that always had the highest grades. Lindsay would always make sure to take part in any activity she could. She was competitive and would always try to be on top. But one night, she stunned her parents with something they didn’t expect. She came home talking about wanting to sign some organ donation forms from the hospital she was volunteering at.
Her mom recalled, « We thought it was a good gesture and encouraged her to do it. » Lindsay was an intelligent girl and never hesitated. She wasn’t indecisive, and soon she returned home with a donation card from the hospital. But it wasn’t too far in the future that they would lose her.
Tammy still remembers the day it happened. Her daughter was out with her best friends. They had been on their way back from school and had been in a fatal accident. They were all taken straight to the ER. Tammy froze when she heard the news. Then her body went into overdrive, and she found herself racing to the hospital. What she’d find would render her speechless.
Tammy couldn’t believe the news she was hearing. Her body seized up. Tammy was barely in the emergency room when the doctors pronounced Lindsay dead. She’d fought to stay by her daughter’s side when Lindsay’s soul passed on. Tammy had only just arrived at the emergency room when they told her.
The days after that blurred into weeks, with everything around Tammy and Chester losing color and intrigue. They had been so broken by their loss until that fateful week. It had been a couple of months since they had to say goodbye to their daughter. To help herself grieve, Tammy would go visit Lindsay’s grave every day after work. But she knew that her daughter wouldn’t want her or Chester to linger and stay sad forever. They knew that for her, they would have to face the facts.
But something strange would happen just moments later. Tammy was walking from her daughter’s grave when she noticed a boy passing. He was no older than seven, with blonde hair and steel gray eyes and had a small backpack. He smiled at Tammy and waved as he walked by. She didn’t think much of it at first but noticed something as the days continued counting. Tammy ran into the same boy the following evening.
The week would continue in this same manner before Tammy decided she’d at least try to see why the boy was always at the cemetery at that time of day. As the new week started, she decided to stay back after greeting the boy on her path back to her car. As always, he smiled, waved, and walked by her. But this time, she didn’t leave. Tammy shadowed the boy with her phone’s camera recording, only to see him walk to Lindsay’s tombstone.
He stood over it for some seconds before sitting down. The scene didn’t make any sense to Tammy, who stopped recording. She couldn’t think of why the boy was next to her daughter’s grave. Thinking maybe he’d confused the tombstones, she decided to step in.
As Tammy approached the boy, she considered the possibility of him being one of Lindsay’s friends but noticed he was too young to have known her daughter on such a level. She made sure he could hear her approach so as not to startle him before saying hi again and asking him what he was doing at Lindsay’s grave.
« I asked him if he knew Lindsay, and he said no, » Tammy said to a reporter from her town’s local news. She also revealed something about the boy that had her tearing up for days. He’d been battling a rare heart condition. After Lindsay passed away, he received her heart through a transplant, which saved his life. But why was he visiting Lindsay’s grave every evening if he’d never met her? « Where’s your mom? » Tammy asked.
He learned from his mom about Lindsay and what she’d done for him, and the past two weeks, he had been asking his mom to drive him to the cemetery to talk to Lindsay about his healing process, Tammy shared amid happy tears. The little boy’s mother was waiting for him in the parking lot. That’s when Tammy approached her and learned all the little boy and his family had been through.
Little Sam had been born with a rare heart condition called unbalanced atrioventricular canal defect. This heart defect allowed blood to move freely through the four chambers of his heart, causing problems with his heart and lungs. A normal heart has sep Chambers to keep the blood from the lungs from mixing with other blood from the rest of the body. By the time Sam was two, he’d already undergone four open-heart surgeries.
Although the surgeries seemed to help, and Sam was able to live a relatively normal life for a few years, things changed when he turned six. Although he’d been on the heart transplant list since he was three, no viable hearts had been donated. Sam’s condition continued to worsen. His mom, Jane, was beginning to lose hope.
According to the American Heart Association, the average wait for a heart transplant depends on several factors; however, it’s hardly ever a quick process. Sam had to wait four years, which is longer than most. When he was six, his heart began to fail. He was hospitalized and had to stay there until a heart became available.
With a serious shortage of donated organs, some people wait years to receive a heart transplant. In fact, around 3,500 Americans are on the heart transplant waiting list at any given time, and they are usually critically ill or die by the time one becomes available. Sam was deteriorating right in front of his family’s eyes, but all they could do was pray and wait.
His case was particularly difficult because they had to wait for a heart that was the perfect size and blood type. « Jane will never forget the day she got the news. His primary doctor came up and told me he had a transplant, » Jane said in an interview. « I think that was the biggest shock for me, like, wow, » she added. It almost was so unreal.
Sam was admitted for surgery the very next day. Meanwhile, Tammy and Chester had just received the news about their daughter, and their lives were falling apart. « As I watched his chest rise, my heart got heavy. God bless the family who chose to donate this precious gift of life to my baby boy, » Jane wrote on Facebook.
Thankfully, Sam’s surgery was a success. Jane immediately saw a difference in his condition when he was wheeled out of the operating room. She couldn’t believe her eyes. Before going in for the heart transplant, Jane had noticed that her son’s skin had been a blue-gray color as a result of not receiving enough oxygenated blood. When he was returned from the operating room, Jane immediately noticed the color of his skin.
« My first reaction was his color, » Jane recalled. « When I looked at him, his color was amazing. » Soon after he was revived, Sam’s breathing improved, and his oxygen rose up to normal levels, all thanks to Lindsay’s heart. « We will be forever grateful for this selfless act, for the family who saved our son’s life, » Jane said. « Always have faith because miracles do happen. »
In fact, Jane made it her mission to find out who had donated their heart to her son. Jane found out who had donated their organs through a nonprofit organization, the United Network for Organ Sharing. Days after the transplant, she found Lindsay’s obituary in the local paper and read her funeral announcement. She learned all about the young woman and how giving she’d been in life until it was suddenly snuffed out forever.
Her heart broke for the McRae family. She wanted to do something. Jane had been waiting for the right moment to contact the McRae family to express her gratitude for their daughter’s final selfless act, but she didn’t want to approach them too soon after their loss. In the meantime, she told Sam about the girl whose heart he had, and he insisted on visiting her at the cemetery.
Finding the plot number wasn’t hard, but now she was face to face with Lindsay’s mother. Tammy listened to Jane’s story and felt a wave of emotion hit her. After months, the pain of losing her daughter was not as sharp now. It felt like a dull, heavy ache she carried with her everywhere. Everything reminded her of Lindsay. Now, the little boy standing in front of her was literally carrying a piece of her and keeping it alive.
She didn’t know how to feel. Grief comes in waves. Tammy had been holding it together that day for the first time in months, but suddenly, the wave crashed over her, threatening to completely engulf her. Lindsay’s beautiful heart had been a perfect match for Sam. If it weren’t for her, he wouldn’t be here. Tammy, who had been completely silent until now, asked a question.
Tammy couldn’t quite wrap her head around the situation. The sudden loss had been so hard to accept in the first place. Now she knew Lindsay was, in a sense, still with her. « May I hear it? » Tammy asked through the tears. « May I listen to her heart? » Sam nodded. So she knelt down and placed her ear against his little chest. She closed her eyes, and there it was—the quick, strong thud, thud, thud of Lindsay’s heart.
Tammy lost herself in its rhythm. She let it soothe her searing pain like a cool balm. For the first time in months, she had a sense that everything would be okay. « She loved to share, so a part of her life and giving some of it to Sam and other children is part of who she was, » she said, smiling.
Tammy contacted the United Network for Organ Sharing to learn who had received Lindsay’s other organs. It turned out that her daughter had saved eight other lives with her organs. The day she died, two people had her lungs, and another had her liver, and others had various other vital pieces of her. The McRae family met all of them, but they felt closest to Sam, the little boy who had her heart.
Tam and Chester had forgotten that their daughter had signed up to be an organ donor before passing and couldn’t believe she’d saved so many lives. « It’s truly the circle of life in its rawest form, » Tammy said. She could never let a soul suffer if she could do something about it. « That’s our Lindsay for. »
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