‘It’s a match’: Watch school worker in need of a kidney get emotional news in Georgia
A school worker in need of a kidney got life-changing news in Georgia, an emotional video shows.
Leon Hammond, an Atlanta-area high school athletic director, thought he was being recognized for an award. But instead, he was surprised with a “special guest,” according to footage posted to Facebook on Tuesday, Nov. 15.
“I’m just like, ‘No. If this is what I think it is, I’m going to break down’,” Hammond told WSB-TV.
That’s when the visitor, Alan Reeves, gave him a note that read: “It’s a match.”
Then, just as Hammond predicted, he became emotional over the news that he was finally getting a kidney, according to video that the donor’s wife, Renee Reeves, shared on Facebook.
“This is the best blessing I could ask for,” Hammond wrote on Twitter. “Thank you allowing me a chance to keep doing what I was put on this earth to do, help change the lives of others.”
Renee Reeves said she was overwhelmed during the moment, which started a new chapter for her family.
“When it boils down to it, we’re giving him the gift of life,” she told McClatchy News in a phone interview. “He might not survive without my husband’s kidney.”
Hammond received the big surprise 13 years after he was diagnosed with focal segmental glomerulosclerosis, a kidney disease that leads to scarring. He said he increasingly lost kidney function, eventually making him eligible for a donor, according to a post on the National Kidney Registry website.
“I am filled with hope and optimism, that I will find my match and be a voice for other individuals who find themselves in my situation,” Hammond wrote on Facebook in August.
His story reached Renee Reeves, who said she told her husband he should consider being an donor. With his permission, she signed him up, starting the journey toward helping Hammond.
Alan Reeves later realized the two were a match for organ donation, but that’s not the only connection they shared.
Alan Reeves previously worked as a school resource officer at McIntosh High School in Peachtree City. Hammond currently serves as athletic director for the school, roughly 30 miles southwest of Atlanta, according to the district.
“I always wanted to give back to McIntosh,” Alan Reeves, who now works as a Secret Service special agent, said in a news release from Fayette County Public Schools. “I just didn’t know this is how.”
A few seconds into the video, Alan Reeves gave Hammond a matching shirt that read: “Kidney buddies for life.” Hammond was seen wiping his eyes with the shirt during the tearful reveal.
Renee Reeves said she has posted about the journey on social media to encourage people to consider organ donation.
“People think that someone else will volunteer or someone else will apply,” she told McClatchy News. “But it really is an easy process.”
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