Nope! She intentionally wanted to start the chain.

The transplant team’s social worker and clinical psychiatrist did require her to have conversations with my father, my siblings and I individually to talk about how we’d feel if we did someday need a kidney and she wasn’t able to donate to us - we all felt the same way, which was that we didn’t feel that she owed us even the potential of a kidney donation, much less the organ itself. Thought that was an interesting part of the process!

My mom donated her kidney to a stranger a couple years ago and the transplant team was able to make a 6 person donation chain following her donation as a result. The ability to set off a reaction that changes that many lives is a beautiful thing. For folks who are considering donation to a stranger (or a “non-directed donation”), many major hospital systems have registries you can sign up for, and transplant teams will be more than happy to meet with you to talk about the process and associated risks.