The Ultimate Gift
By MONICA BUCHANAN
Updated 5:00 PM EST, Fri, Nov 27, 2009
The official start of the holiday shopping season is here, which also brings the season of giving. One Colchester man is giving the season whole new meaning.
“I’m donating a kidney next week to a complete stranger. It’ll go to a person I’ll probably never meet,” said Fred Brown of Colchester.
Brown says the inspiration came from an NBC CT story that aired 3 months ago about a man who donated his kidney to a co-worker.
“I remember thinking, I can do that. It’s the ultimate gift. I give blood every 56 days. My wife and I donate dictionaries around town. We do this to remind people to give,” said Brown.
Doctors at Hartford Hospital say only 15 people have volunteered to donate a kidney to a complete stranger in the last 6 years.
“It’s funny that people think if you’re going to help someone out there must be something wrong. Typically there isn’t anything wrong,” said Dr. David Hull, the director of transplantation at Hartford Hospital.
Brown says he’ll be out of work for a few weeks, but hopes to be better in time for the first snow. The reason? He can’t lift anything over 10 pounds until he’s better and he says his snow blower weighs a lot more than that.
“I just wanted to do something for someone else. Everyone can do something, it doesn’t have to be a kidney,” said Brown.
First Published: Nov 27, 2009 4:42 PM EST
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