Awareness Greeting Cards

Celebrate the season with these special holiday products. The colorful design is available on ornaments, holiday cards and more! Take a peek!

Also available are t-shirts, mugs, sweatshirts, yard signs and more. Check out the entire Celebrate Life Holiday Collection today!

Semi-Happy Thanksgiving!

For those that already know me, the week of Thanksgiving is not something that settles well with my stomach. It is this time of year that people are remembering what they are thankful for and getting geared up for the winter holiday season. For me, it is quite different.

It was this day a few years ago that I came home from work to find my husband unable to move or even get to the bathroom without being in great pain. The following day he was to see his Cystic Fibrosis doctor for a regular appointment and didn't see the need on seeking immediate medical help. Luckily for him, I knew medical attention was needed because the doctors told me shortly afterward that if we would have waited an extra day, he would have been dead. It was pneumonia and it was bad. So bad that he was put on a ventilator the night going into Thanksgiving day and I got to spend that "thankful" day in the MICU ward at our local hospital watching my husband fight to live.

After 4.5 weeks, he was transferred to the transplant hospital 2 hours away to be reviewed for a kidney transplant as well as a double lung transplant. Lucky for us, he was already on the transplant list for new lungs but his kidneys were now failing and they needed to assess if he was to receive both lungs and kidney from his hero donor down the line. He was placed on the list for both and after another 4.5 weeks of being in that hospital, I was able to get him home; ventilator, medical equipment and all!

For 9 months total he was on a ventilator and after a positive sleep study, they removed the ventilator and he was back to 4L of O2 by nasal cannula.

Although everything turned out fine in the end, and my husband has now been 3 years post transplant without any rejection, Thanksgiving was such a traumatic event that year that it still stays with me. I am truly thankful for my husband's life, thankful to his donor and family, and thankful to God. The trauma of that time will stay with me for some time to come and it seems that although the butterflies in my stomach are lessening in number, they still remain. Hopefully one day I can truly celebrate Thanksgiving fully and go to Thanksgiving dinner at our family's house without those butterflies tagging along.

Happy 3rd Transplant Anniversary!

Yesterday, November 11, 2007, was my wonderful husband's 3rd Transplant Anniversary! It is amazing to realize that 3 years ago yesterday, we were wondering if his double lung transplant was ever going to be realized. It is not that we didn't think it would ever happen but rather, after 3.5 years of waiting and 5 dry runs, you wonder whether or not each call you receive from the hospital will be "the one".

So, this weekend we did a couple of things Greg has never done before. I am proud to say that the first new thing we tried was on Saturday and only happened after a lot of play nagging on my part. You see, we were in the middle of the mall and there was Santa Claus waiting for children to take pictures with. Usually the line is straight down the mall and it was now or never in my mind. I instinctively grabbed Greg and walked over to Santa. Now realize that we are two 33-year old adults without any children and here I was pulling my husband over to sit on Santa's lap. After using a couple of fun "wife" techniques, he agreed and we took our first ever Santa picture together!

It was his anniversary day that he was more looking forward to. By some grace of God, Greg's dad got an extra ticket to see the Green Bay Packers vs. the Minnesota Vikings at Lambeau Field... in a luxury sky box! Needless to say, Greg could not pass up this once in a lifetime opportunity; especially seeing the Green Bay Packers in action for the first time in the new stadium and in style! This was a dream come true and he still had a huge smile on his face when he got home later that night.

What a way to celebrate the anniversary of his miracle! It is humbling to think we went from a house filled with medical equipment and oxygen machines to an opportunity to take life by the horns and enjoy the ride.

Here's praying for 50 more healthy transplant anniversaries! Thank you God and thank you to our donor and his awesome family!

Organ Donation Awareness Fundraisers

Did you know that Angel Cove has a number of fundraiser items to help people raise additional awareness for Organ and Tissue Donation? Well, we do!

Angel Cove has multi-packs of buttons, magnets, stickers, and more. They are perfect for fundraisers or to raise further organ donation and tissue transplant awareness.

Check out our line of Organ Donation Awareness Fundraiser Products today!