It Truly is a Wonderful Life

by Lauren Larsen, grateful blood recipient, memoir junkie, and master PacMan player.

I’ve kept a personal journal for more than 35 years now.  My first—filled with loopy handwriting and circles dotting each “i”—is gold and has a little lock and key to safeguard the juicy secrets of a twelve-year-old. Mischelle is my best friend.  Or, I promise to stop picking my nose this year. Or, I like Kevin, Don, Charlie.

Ten years ago—around this time, my journal spoke of all the goodness in my life.  My husband, Jeff, had just sold his small technology company (yes, five months before the crash).  We’d begun our search to buy a home in Noe Valley, our first (1500 Square feet costs how much?).  And we were expecting our first child—a girl we’d already named Clare after the angel in my favorite movie, It’s a Wonderful Life.  The last journal entry before my daughter’s birth, reads: I’m getting mentally prepped for Clare’s delivery, which I predict will be easy. I LOVE BEING PREGNANT.

Shortly after writing that, my pregnancy took a turn for the worse and landed me in the intensive care unit after an emergency c-section to save my baby’s life.  Round-the-clock blood transfusions sustained me for six weeks, while my body decided whether it wanted to live or die.  Eventually, my organs began working again, my bleeding issues subsided, and I left the hospital.  At two months old, baby Clare came home from her uncle’s house in Southern California, where she’d been living since she was five days old.  We were, at last, a family.

This Thanksgiving, as with every Thanksgiving since my illness, you can bet my journal will be packed with gratitude, not only for my little family—Jeff, Clare and our three dogs, but for those we now consider family—the more than 200 complete strangers who took the time to roll up their sleeves at Blood Centers of the Pacific to help a new mom in need.  Blood donors are angels, pure and simple.  And they prove time and time again that it truly is a wonderful life.

Thank you, blood donors.

For more on Lauren’s story view this wonderful video thanks to In The Telling and Johnson & Johnson.

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