SEBASTIAN – Carey Anderson recently celebrated the 3-year anniversary of receiving a kidney transplant. He celebrated with kidney buddy, Annie, who selflessly gave Carey one of her kidneys.
Carey and his wife Lisa had only known Annie about a year and a half when she offered her kidney to Carey. She was as close to a match as you can be and not be a blood relative.
Annie Keyes and her husband Dan moved to Sebastian only 1 month earlier than Carey and Lisa.
“Our dogs met first! Annie was trying to finish her testing when Carey had heart failure which put him and Annie on hold. Once he was active, everything moved forward,” Lisa told Sebastian Daily.
“Annie was not a long time friend. She had not thought about kidney donation before this. She just thought if she could save this man’s life and didn’t well, she didn’t want to find out how that felt,” Lisa stated.
“Annie was completely changing how we had been living the previous 3 years. Carey could be healthy again, I would get my husband back, and we could say goodbye to the turmoil that had consumed our lives,” Lisa added.
Three years later they continue to celebrate!
“We celebrate a healthy life for both Annie and Carey. We celebrate people who offer a kidney to those in need. And we celebrate life and love. We also celebrate our God who brought Dan and Annie from Colorado, and us from California, to the same state, the same town, the same street, and three houses apart. We celebrate Trouble, Dan and Annie’s dog, and our dear Hula Girl, who is now over the rainbow bridge, and their mutual awkwardness in not knowing how to play with each other. All this played a part in our meeting, in our friendship, and in our new lives of being family. We are forever grateful and so very blessed,” Lisa said.
“We are thanking: Annie for all she gave, she has an amazing kidney. Dan, for being such great support thru it all, without his support of Annie our life would look very different. God does work miracles,” Lisa concluded.
Annie also has her own memories of this incredible story, about keeping a man alive and saving Lisa’s husband.
“This may sound weird, and I hope that it is not read out of context or in a different way than it is meant. I never gave birth to children and never had that ‘oh my gosh, I made a life’ moment, but on 4/20/16 I did have that moment in a different, but I think the same way. On April 20, 2016, at 9:00 a.m., I gave life to another human being. I do not know the love & joy you have when you see a child for the first time. But, I can tell you that the love and joy you have when your surgeon shows you a photo they took in the operating room of my kidney in Carey’s body, connected and working, is beyond any words and almost incomprehensible,” Annie said.