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NEW YORK (PIX11) — Sometimes you’re really lucky to be able to do a story. That was the case with this one. It was a pleasure to be able to do.
Back in October, we told you about Torrey Green, a middle school art teacher in Boca Raton, Florida. He’d been on dialysis for almost seven years and needed a lifesaving kidney transplant as soon as possible.
He’d already faced so many disappointments. Three donors had backed out. He tells us his own family wouldn’t help him.
He tried to deal with all the sad drama, telling us, “I’ve got a great job that I love, so I just have to focus on these things.”
We’d gotten involved with Torrey on a fluke. We actually did a piece about Alan Finkelstein, a young man from Queens who needed a transplant. After our story aired he found a donor elsewhere. So we knew about Torrey and referred all the people who’d tested for Alan over to him.
It looked like one person would be a match. But Torrey’s hopes were dashed when that turned out not to be the case. He needed a miracle.
She was in her New Jersey home watching the story we did on Torrey last fall. In the back of her mind, she’d been thinking about donating a kidney for a while. Something clicked.
“When I saw Torrey I said ‘this is the person I’ve been waiting for,'” Sara told us. “I can’t put it into words. There’s just something about him that I was drawn to email you.”
Her husband, Greg, had fallen asleep on the couch while Sara was watching our story. When he awoke they say their conversation went something like this:
Sara: “I said I’m thinking about donating a kidney.”
Greg: “The first reaction, of course, was are you mad?”
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