One Extra Kidney — Part II
[April 2 update: This was written the hours following surgery on March 30, 2021. Dave is recovering well and spotted running the halls like a teenager as his kidney functioning is going remarkably well. Ray was discharged today and resting at home being cared for by the sweet Chunglings. Read here for One Extra Kidney — Part I]
Tonight, as I lie in a hospital bed recovering from a recent surgery, it's difficult to reconcile the tremendous love and care I've received from a group of healthcare providers of diverse backgrounds with the pain and discrimination many Asian Americans have recently endured across our country. I know discrimination is nothing new—for Asian Americans or other minority groups. I have been called racial slurs. More painful still, I grieve as my son has been called racial slurs by other children, so I know this disease of hate and derision has spread to the next generation. Tonight, I hold these experiences in tension as I remind myself not to succumb to the deceptive and lazy narrative of "us versus them."
The doctors, nurses, coordinators, and support staff involved in my kidney transplant surgery journey at the UPMC Harrisburg hospital have all been incredibly nurturing. Each one did their work with the utmost care, modeling genuine kindness and compassion alongside professional competence. My sincere apologies for my inability to name them all and recount their exceptional kindness to me and my family at a time when clips of hate-filled negativity continue to be peddled through the news cycle. Nonetheless, I’ll highlight just a few. There was Jackie, the donor transplant coordinator, who had to delicately break the news of postponement several times over, and Dana, the overnight nurse who nurtured me by indulging my post-surgery 5 a.m. chocolate ice cream craving. And then there’s the legendary Dr. Harold Yang, Surgical Director and Transplant Surgeon, who’s been the backbone for building up for the past 20 years an outstanding UPMC Pinnacle Kidney center. I feel immensely privileged that my path intersected with each of theirs because my white father-in-law (his last name is actually “White”) needed a kidney and it so happens that his Malaysian son-in-law through some divine intervention was a match.
I’m reminded of the words that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. penned from the Birmingham Jail in 1963: that we have the opportunity to be the thermostat, not merely the thermometer. We can do more than just reflect and return what’s around us. Change is possible, and we can be that change. It is important to remember that the great enemy is not merely against skin-tones or individuals of different backgrounds but the ugliness of violence, hate, and bigotry.
I hope that this kidney gives my father-in-law not only the opportunity to live and flourish a few more months or years but also the chance to teach my children their rich Irish farming heritage, even as I hope to teach them to embrace their Malaysian-Chinese heritage. I want my mixed-race children to love every part of their background and to grow up with resiliency, knowing that they too can sow seeds of compassion, generosity, and love. My wife and I are eternally grateful to belong right here in Central Pennsylvania, in a community we call home that is helping my wife and me raise our children to be thermostats, not thermometers.
