“Learn more, be nice to everybody, make more friends.”
These were the words 12-year-old Kimberly Adams jotted down in her notebook at the start of the school year. It was likely a reminder or even her mantra of what was important to focus on. She was a kind, caring and generous child who enjoyed playing soccer and doing gymnastics.
Kim was the youngest of three children to Ken and Susan of Front Royal, VA. They were attending one of Kim’s soccer games when, in November 2000, an unexpected tragedy unfolded.
During the game, Kim started complaining of a headache and began vomiting on the field. She was taken to Potomac Hospital and soon medevac’d to Inova Fairfax, where she was found to have an arteriovenous malformation in her brain. This had been there since birth, was undetected and had finally ruptured. She was declared brain dead at Inova.
While processing this unthinkable event, Ken and Susan were approached by representatives from Infinite Legacy, who walked them through the end-of-life process and presented them with the opportunity to donate Kim’s organs and tissues. While they both were registered organ donors themselves, they could never have imagined making the decision on behalf of one of their children.
Nonetheless, after reflecting on their daughter and the life she lived, they believed that she would insist on helping others as an organ donor.
“It wasn’t the easiest decision, but it was the right thing to do,” says the family.
Kim donated her lungs, kidneys, pancreas, liver, heart and corneas. The family corresponded with and learned much about their daughter’s recipients. They even had the privilege of meeting her liver recipient, a 65-year-old man from India.
“She really is alive in those people.”
During the next few years, the family attended many events and other programs for donor family members, including the Donor Family Gathering, the Transplant Games of America and they even attended the Rose Parade in Pasadena, CA in Kim’s honor and saw the Donate Life Float. They say that it is a gift to be a part of the donation and transplantation community and that, while they miss Kim terribly, they are grateful something good came out of her tragic death. They are happy at the benefit of her organ donations to the recipients and glad that it could give them a bit of “light in the darkness”.
Susan Adams is two years into her retirement. Upon hitting this milestone in her life, she had two dreams – #1: donate a kidney and #2: do more backpacking. In July 2024, she fulfilled her first dream of doing what her daughter did two decades ago – she gave someone the gift of life, as an altruistic living kidney donor. She does not know the recipient, only that they live in Virginia like herself. While she is still working on the second dream, the fact that she was able to honor the memory of her daughter after all these years brings her some contentment. She was also inspired to donate after seeing just how much Kim’s donation changed the recipient’s lives.
Many are surprised to learn that more than 90% of people on the waiting list can be helped by living donors who donate either a kidney or the lobe of their liver. “It has had very little effect on my everyday life,” Susan said. “The process can take a while, but the surgery itself is pretty simple. Living donors can contribute a great deal towards ending the waiting list and making sure no one dies waiting for an organ.”
Organ donors save lives and bring hope to the more than 100,000 people waiting for a transplant in the U.S. Learn more about donation and register to be a donor today at infinitelegacy.org.
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