God’s promise was never that life would be fair. God’s promise was that when we had to confront the unfairness of life, we would not have to do so alone because He would be with us.
– The twenty-third psalm
Whoever saves one life saves the world entire.
– The Talmud
Today is October 15th, 2020. One year ago today I received a stem cell transplant. Soon after I sat down to write a letter to the stranger who had donated her stem cells and saved my life.
I knew nothing about her other than she lived in Germany and was thirty-seven (one year older than me) and she had beautiful cursive handwriting, much better than mine. The letter she had sent me (the one I was responding to) was written on colorful stationary and in perfect English, although if she had someone translate the words for her, I don’t know.
She called me friend and said she was sending love and best wishes for my recovery. She sent me lip balm and hand cream and cinnamon candies and a hat she had knitted herself.
I had no stationary, so I ripped out a few pages from my notebook and clipped the edges with scissors to make them as clean as possible. I had terrible handwriting, even worse than usual; I was taking so many medications I could barely keep track of them, and I didn’t know which one was causing the tremor in my hands, the slight vibration that made it almost impossible to write.
I sat in stasis, pen in hand, hovered over the page. What was holding me back wasn’t my tremulous hands, or my penmanship, or my lack of stationary. It was that I didn’t know how to thank a stranger who had just saved my life.
Here I was, thirty-six but withered away because of what had happened to me, skin brown and mottled from the radiation, eyes sunken and hollow. How could anything I ever did going forward be as significant as the act that saved me? What could I say when I simultaneously felt I had been saved, but also felt like everything had been taken away?
I wasn’t sure what to write her, so I wrote her the truth.
God’s promise was never that life would be fair. When I found out my cancer had relapsed, I hoped I would die quickly. It’s because I had learned there is something worse than death, and it is fear.
That night, my oncologist, Dr. Eradat, came to see me in the hospital. He sat next to me on the hospital bed and and told me the prognosis wasn’t as good this time. He wouldn’t give me a number (he never wanted to take away hope), so I did the research myself. The most recent paper on the subject showed a 5-year survival rate for someone like me as 18%.
Dr. Eradat told me a stem cell transplant was my only hope. Without it I would die. I needed a genetically matched donor. Did I have any siblings?
As I listened to him I felt the blood drain out of my face, and I tried to control the trembling of my hands but I couldn’t.
“I have a brother,” I said. “But he’s not biologically related to me. I’m adopted.”
He frowned. “We’ll have to find a match on the bone marrow registry, then.”
I think family is the order in which you call people when you find out you’re going to die. First I called my parents. My mom picked up the phone, and when I told her she said “Oh…fuck,” and then I don’t remember what was said after.
She was with me the first time it happened—through the diagnosis and three years of chemotherapy, and she stayed home from work to take care of me, and she blended my food into a little paste when the sores in my mouth made it too painful to eat, and she wrapped herself around me when I flung myself into her arms crying that I was sure the pain would kill me—so I’m not sure much more needed to be said.
Next I called my brother, Zach. Whatever shock he felt on the phone he concealed well, but his wife told me later that after we hung up he frantically Google searched “relapsed T cell acute lymphoblastic lymphoma stem cell transplant prognosis” and then locked himself in the bathroom for the rest of the afternoon and sobbed.
I told him he couldn’t be a donor match for me because we weren’t biologically related, but he signed up to be a donor on the Be The Match website and mailed in his DNA kit anyway.
God’s promise was never that life would be fair. There are over twenty million people on the registry, but because so many genes need to be matched, many people cannot find a single matched donor. The match rate is the lowest—perhaps under 50%—for people who are of mixed ethnicity (I am half Caucasian and half North African).
I always thought my ethnic background was so interesting. Now I wished I were just plain-ol’ lily white.
When I got out of the hospital I continued to work and see patients (because what else was I going to do?). When my hair started falling out from the chemotherapy I bought hats and scarfs to cover my head, and when I shat my pants in front of a patient because I no longer had any control over my body I ran into the bathroom and hid until someone came in I could ask for help. I lost my favorite pair of pants that day.
In between patients I would check my phone and email obsessively, waiting to hear if the doctors had found a match for me.
At night there was no escape from the fear. I would lie in bed—hearing only the hollow echo of emptiness vibrating back to me, observing myself as if I were hovering outside of my body—and think about what it would feel like to die.
Most likely the tumor in my chest would continue to rapidly grow unchecked, and it would become so large it would surround and squeeze my lungs and heart, and I would either go into heart failure or suffocate to death.
To expect anything else felt futile; to have hope felt too sad and too crushing.
One day I was at my office, sitting at my desk and clicking through work emails. I had sent a mass announcement to my patients letting them knowing I was closing my practice, and making sure they had referrals. I received many beautiful emails in response from my patients telling me how sorry they were and how they wished me well. There is one message I will never forget.
It was from a shy, reserved young man with treatment-resistant depression. Something about his age (too young to be suffering so much) and his demeanor (charmingly awkward) endeared him to me, and I so desired to take his pain away. Nothing I did, though, seemed to work. I had felt like a failure for letting him down.
His message to me told a different story. It might have contained more words than he had spoken cumulatively since we first started working together six months earlier. He wrote:
“I’ll be forever grateful for what your guidance has done for me. Until you started treating me, I never trusted the therapists I had seen and I didn’t believe what I had was really something that could be helped. I thought I’d just have to deal with it.
I want you to know that there are very few people that have made as positive an impact on my life as you, and your help truly changed my life. It may have even saved it.”
Something shifted in me when I read it. Had I really saved his life? Could it be true my life was worth this much to others, that sometimes we help the world in ways we don’t realize? Could I hope for my life not just for myself, but for those I might one day help?
I started to cry, and then I started to beg. It felt futile to hope, but I did it anyway. Please God, I don’t want to die. I don’t want to die.
At least one life had been saved, even if it wasn’t mine.
It was shortly after that we found her—the one in twenty million who shared enough of my genes that she could save my life. All they would tell me was she lived in Germany and was thirty-seven years old. I asked, Was this confirmed? Did she promise? Could we wrap her in bubble wrap until it happened (you know, just to be safe)?
My transplant was scheduled. I was admitted to the hospital and received my conditioning treatment (chemotherapy and radiation). She donated her cells in Germany, and they were couriered overnight to Los Angeles. I couldn’t let myself believe it was really happening until it did—until I saw the pale pink bag of cells hanging off of my IV pole, infusing into my arm.
It worked. The next month was hard, but her cells successfully engrafted into my bone marrow. Over this past year I’ve been slowly recovering. My DNA is gone; my blood cells are no longer mine, but hers.
Now it was not just one life that had been saved, but two.
Then… something really amazing happened.
Two months ago, my brother received a call.
It was from Be the Match, and they were calling about that DNA kit he had mailed in the year before, the one he did in symbolic solidarity with me. He was a perfect DNA match for someone who needed a stem cell transplant, a sixty-seven year old man—the one in twenty million who shared enough of his genes he could save his life. A stem cell transplant was the only cure for this man’s disease. He had no family who could donate. Without it he would die.
My brother submitted a second kit for confirmation, and then did the pre-donation physicals and labs. The week before, he received injections of Neupogen, a medication that stimulates your bone marrow to make extra stem cells. Then he drove from his home in Fort Lauderdale to Miami where he was hooked up to a machine that filtered the extra stem cells out of his blood. It took eight hours.
When he was done the cells were whisked away and couriered overnight to wherever they had to go the save the person who needed them.
Maybe this man, too, had asked if my brother could be wrapped in bubble wrap, asked if he had promised, prayed he would follow through. Maybe he couldn’t let himself believe it was really happening until it did—until he saw the pale pink bag of cells hanging off of his IV pole, infusing into his arm.
It was not two lives that had been saved, but three.
When I was in Hebrew school I learned about the part of the Talmud that says, “Whoever saves one life saves the world entire.” I didn’t understand it then, but I understand it now.
God’s promise was never that life would be fair. But God promised that when we had to confront the unfairness of life, we would not have to do so alone because we are unavoidably interconnected.
I’m not sure I believe in God—in the sense that God is a conscious being who dictates the events of the universe. I believe the universe is random, chaotic, and without imposed order. But isn’t this idea even more beautiful? It’s not up to God to take chaos and create connection—it’s up to us.
God never promised fairness, but he promised a choice. Was my life saved, or was it taken away? Perhaps I can hold those two thoughts simultaneously in my mind. Perhaps I can choose which one I want to focus on.
I choose to take my chaos and construct meaning from it, to create coherence, to become whole through telling a story.
I’ve decided my story is this:
Every action I’ve ever taken, and ever will take, and every action that has been taken for me, creates an energy that expands out into the entire universe. And energy can never be destroyed, but only transformed, so even after I die, the energy of every good thing I’ve done and every good thing done for me will continue to ripple out forever, into eternity. There it will exist for everyone, always.
This was so profoundly brilliant and honest
I’ve been following you for a couple of years and and praying for your full recovery
Jane from NY xo
Been following you for a number of years I think. Your determination to survive impressed me over and over. Because of very early child abuse I have difficulty imagining survival beyond today. But have had a reasonably good life. I am almost 73 and not objecting quite so strenuously to continuing. Lord knows I have never had to deal with survival on the level you describe. Thank you for communicating the way you do.
Bless you much.
CRVA
This is just awesome. I wish you the best continue to stay strong and enjoy your life. Your such an inspiration.
This is beautiful. I am so glad you are doing well and that the transplant was successful. I have followed you for many year, before your first leukemia dx) and seeing you healthy and happy is wonderful.
Ugh……ignore the typos! I am tired and obviously not proofreading!
Ditto Cindy.
From Bobby Kennedy’s Ripple of Hope speech, 1966…South Africa..
“It is from numberless diverse acts of courage and belief that human history is shaped each time a man stands up for an ideal or acts to improve the lot of others or strikes out against injustice. He sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current that can sweep down the mightiest wall of oppression and resistance.”
Beautifully written and soft for my heart. ❤️
It is a keeper.
Namaste.
I have also been following you for quite a while and am so glad to read these hopeful and encouraging words. So happy you are doing well and able to do the good work!
I too have followed you for many years. It is inspiring to follow your life, it’s ups and downs, and I am so thankful for your transplant and your cure. Keep on sharing, it helps me to see beyond what my life holds, to see the broader view of what life can be now.
Also I have read your story before you first became ill and am wishing you and all the good energy you speak of and the hope for that thoughtful caring young man and all the donors and skilled people who are that resonance
Continuing resonance and joy
I am overjoyed for you and the miracle of the transplant. I have been following you since your dx. I think it was about when I was dx (2009) with ovarian cancer that also returned, but NED for now. 🙏
Your writing is so inspirational- I have an integrative MD and the blend of all of this has helped to cope with this “cancer life”.
Please “ Un-retire” your patients need you. Thank you.
I am praying that you can continue to live your life – pain free and cancer free.
All the best to you.
Dear Elena
My husband John Whelan faced the same challenges you did and underwent the same transplant you did at city of hope the last of 3 transplants. He lived 12 years past what the prognosis was ( multiple myeloma) . But my point is this he went though similar challenges and came up with the same conclusion as you it’s all about the energy you put in to this world, and to this day he lives on in our daughter, his friends, his students, me , his family, and is never forgotten . He changed peoples lives . How many of us can say that we changed peoples lives ? I do think this is the substance of life : What have we contributed to others in this world? Whether or not we believe in god this I think is a measure of how much our life is valued . So even if you changed one persons life for the better you have done good . Wishing you all the health and happiness in world . Fiona Whelan
Wow! I will be looking in to the be the match process soon and I would love to give the gift of life if at all possible. So glad you are doing well. I’ve followed your journey since the beginning as well.
So much love to you!
Oh! I heart this ♥️🧡 sooo much! I’ve followed you for years and I’m so glad you are doing well. I too, have been a “Be The Match” donor for decades…and although I’ve never been matched…I feel strongly that just making this choice and being one of the 20 million makes a difference, I energetically. And who knows? I still may receive the call—I’m
only 60. Warm Blessings and great health to you and your family.
What a beautiful and true story of the power of good acts living on and multiplying. Your understanding of God reminds me of a theologian who taught that God exists in the moral imperative of caring for each other. I agree with both of you and greatly rejoice for and sm blessed by your healing.
So thankful your transplant was successful. Have read your posts since first diagnosis. You write your feelings, feelings that are shared by many, in a beautiful and articulate way. Thank you for sharing your wisdom and insight gained on your cancer journey. I wish you much success and health in the years to come. Blessings.
You truly are an inspiration, I am not sure how I came upon your story but I have followed you through the years and I am so happy to read this today. I am in awe of how you have handled all of this, you probably do not realize how many life you have touched. When I read your stories I sometimes wonder how can one woman have so much strength and pray for you to continue to be healthy, happy and strong. You are truly AMAZING!
I have followed you for many years, too. In the last few years, I have been diagnosed with two unrelated cancers, one of which required surgeries, chemotherapy, and radiation. The most current one has been cured with a double mastectomy just over a week ago. I am currently recovering and actually saw your email just as I crawled into bed, in pain. I am no longer crying as your words took my thoughts away from my own hurt. There is such an interconnectedness, and I don’t know exactly why I chose to follow you in the beginning but I am so glad I have, as you truly do make a difference in the world, definitely in mine, and I love the everlasting ripples that result from such interactions. Thank you for continuing to impact with your words, thoughts, intention and beauty.
I’ve been following you since before you got ill I think….I believe I told you my BFF in the whole world’s name is Elana. She is an M.D. who considered Psychiatry, but became a G.P….and now works for Blue Cross Blue Shield. I was married for 30 years to a Psychiatrist – Jewish of course :). Both of my children are adopted. I too saved a life… not through a donation … but through a belief that my daughter – who suffered abuse for many years as a child, was a good kind person who deserved better. She was in a failed adoption by a family member who was getting ready to dump her in a very bad unlicensed home for bad kids. We successfully ‘kidnapped’ her with the help of her neighbors …. got an emergency detention order from the courts where we lived, and successfully adopted her at the age of 9. It was no easy street… but today she is a beautiful, compassionate, happily married woman. It is very hard for me to accept ‘praise’ for what I did….I don’t look at it as anything special. But when you wrote the Talmud quote about saving a life… it touched me. I am thrilled you are getting better, and wish you continued good health.
Thank you for your honesty in sharing your story. Godspeed in all your ventures! xo
❤️
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this is so beautifully written and brave in every way. thank you for sharing and continuing to shine your light and do the work. amazing how love and faith create the ways in and through.
I’ve been so grateful for your sharing; over the many years.
I’ve been following you since before your diagnosis. I’m so happy to hear that you found a donor match. If you get a chance, please let people know the importance of registering with Be The Match/NMDP, specially those is minority groups as minority patients have a very difficult time finding a match. May you be blessed with health and love for many many years! Big hug !
I am so glad that you are doing great! I just voted for stem cell research continuation!!!
Hugs,
Nurcin
You sweet lady are one of my heroes! I survived cancer over 8 years ago & have followed your journey for years. I’m so happy you are well & doing good. God is not through with you yet! You inspire hope to so many you don’t even know about 😊🙏🏻😊
I, too, have Lymphoma and have followed you for years.
Thank you for your encouragement.
Thank you for your vulnerability.
I am so happy, with you, on this first year anniversary.
L
So beautifully written and the positivity is so needed at this time.
Thank you Elana for sharing your journey with us. It’s filled with hope, strength and love! You inspire me on so many levels. My favorite memory of you is seeing how beautiful you looked on your wedding day. Lifted in that chair with your beautiful bright smile. Love u my freind! Grateful to know you. And bless your brother for his kindness. 💗
I can feel the energy from what you have written.. thank you so much….and bless you
Thank you for sharing your story. Recently I’ve been digging into R/R DLBCL and patient stories such as yours, so eloquently written, are good and helpful to hear.
Your story embodies the spirit of the book that changed my life, Mans Search for Meaning. I’ve been following you for years and so glad to hear you are doing well.
Maybe You could share a link to the donor registry here?
All the best to you
You wrote so beautifully. I wish you only good health and happiness! Your insight is similar to that of Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks in his book To Heal a Fractured World. Whether God exists is a question we can not answer but our actions have neverending influence on others.
❤️
Followed you for years, so happy you’re doing well. Beautiful sentiment, beautifully written.
wonderful!
Your courage and honesty inspire me. I, too, have followed your journey, and I’m so happy that you’re doing well. ❤️
I , too have followed your amazing story over the last few years and am so happy for you and the wonderful gift you received from the woman in Germany.
I too believe that we are all intimately connected in ways we can never truly appreciate, dependent in some sense for our very lives (like you and the donor) and happiness on virtual strangers. We are all in this crazy world together – so great that your brother was able to help somebody too. Your story has inspired me to find out how to become a stem cell donor here where I live . Thank you for sharing your incredible story of courage and hope . I look forward to reading more about your plans for the future…
I cannot remember how long I’ve been following you or how you caught my attention. I think it was the word zen that called out all those long years ago. It’s been a remarkable journey listening to how your story has expanded in directions that I would have never imagined – I’ve been distressed, in awe, sad, encouraged and sometimes stunned (by your courage, despair and deep reflections on life). I’m so glad that you are still in the earth bound universe and your energy of goodness continues to grace the world.
So proud to know and love you. You are an inspiration on the deepest levels of being a human ❤️
I am so happy to hear that you are doing so well and so happy that your brother was able to donate and save a life as well.
In the Torah God gives us a clear description of what He expects us to do: to be fair and just, to take care of the weaker links in our society (ie widows and orphans)to be kind to each other, to take responsibility for the welfare of our fellow man.
The miraculous part of this is that we are created with the capability to save each other’s lives; from blood donations, to bone marrow transplants, to kidney donation, all from one human being to another; to say nothing of organ donations after death.
We have been created to cure each other!
Wishing you continued good health!
Beautiful and inspiring. Thank you for sharing your wisdom and experience with us. You’ve undoubtedly created many positive ripples in our world, these insights only being the latest.
This brings me joy to know that you are doing well. I have been following your journey pre-cancer. You are a beautiful warrior. May the next chapter of your life be one filled with ongoing good health and light.
all my best
Beautiful! You have inspired so many through sharing your journey with us. Thank you so much, and may your health continue to improve.
Dear Elana,
Your last paragraph strikes me as absolute truth and I love and appreciate how concisely you distilled down the complexity of our energetic existence. Nothing is ever really lost. In Essence, we never really die.
With Gratitude,
Eva
That was beautifully written. I’ve followed your story for quite a while now, and I’m so glad that you found your marrow donor! I thought you might like to know that your story inspired me to sign up to be a donor on Be The Match. They haven’t matched me with anyone yet, but I hope that someday I can do what your German friend and your brother have done and provide hope for healing to someone who needs it.
WOW!! Elana!!!! Some people demonstrate SUCH wisdom and strength in their Soul’s ability to make a choice on what to focus; on what “energy” to move with , through each day and into the next day.
I am VERY thankful that you did “have a match!” ~ Even from so far away. Your life was to be saved and your donor must feel very “chosen” also to have been a part of such an intimate and life giving exchange and bond.
Thank you for sharing your story. I have a best friend who is living with ALS . At this point she does still have her speech, however, month by month she deals with new changes that impact her every day. As far as my life, I am fortunate thus far to not have been ill. I have, however, dealt with major disappointments in life that continue to “live” on a level in my heart and mind.
I have learned and lived also with the decision to focus on the choice of receiving the gifts, of which I have received many, in my life. I pray that should I ever be truly afraid of health issues that I will hold your story close and pull strength from it.
I do believe in God and pray that He will continue to hold you close; that you will continue to grow stronger and that your days will be healthier and happier; that love will ALWAYS be a part of them.
Much love to you.
~ Ann
Thank you so much for sharing this. I needed this, today, this morning, more than I can express. You are an inspiration and your brother is too. Continued blessings and light.
My Dearest Elana. God Loves you and is Always with you and has Special Plans for you!
You are Always in My Heart and Prayers!
Love You 😘 🌹
XOXO
Nancy
John Cole’s Aunt
So happy you are okay! Lots of love to you❤️ You keep me going when things get tough. I’ve had RA 21 years. I’m doing pretty good. Thank you for all your bravery and kindness!
Your STORY and openness and transparency from the very beginning..has, undoubtedly, impacted so many people.
This special GIFT will be the one that keeps on GIVING.
This makes my heart happy! I’m so glad you are doing well and happy to hear about the ripple effect of your experience. I had to remove myself from the Be the Match registry after my own cancer diagnosis. It made me so sad. However, enough time has passed that I can donate blood again. This makes me incredibly happy because my mom died of acute myeloid leukemia and received many blood transfusions. I now pay it forward in honor of my beautiful mom and all the beautiful people who helped her.
Well, I guess I needed a good cry because I haven’t stopped since I read your post about thirty minutes ago. I discovered you just one blog post before you found out you were sick the first time and have been following you since. What struck me in that first post was your incredible positivity and hopefulness and empathetic. Despite receiving two cancer diagnoses since then, you have remained all those things and even more. Sometimes I think about you at the most random moments and it catches me off guard. But now that I think about it, it makes perfect sense. You pop into my subconscious at moments where I need to be reminded to stay hopeful and positive and empathetic. You have no idea how many lives you have changed for the better with your honest sharing and with your writing. And that’s not even counting the many patients you have helped professionally. I am very lucky to have mistakenly found you on the Internet somehow and am so thankful to have known you if only by your writing and sharing. I wish you health and happiness till 120 and if it should fall one day short or even a decade or two or three, you will have lived a wondrous and meaningful life. And that is all we could ever hope for.
I’m so happy that you are in life.
*my
Your story is such a gift to share. As a high school counselor I take your words to heart and will carry them with me. THANK YOU. So happy that a donor match existed for you. The world is a better place with you in it!
You are an inspiration! Thank you for sharing this wonderful news. I love your wisdom and insight and honesty and spirit. All the best to you
Following you for years- I wanted you to know that reading your posts filled with so much honesty made me feel not so alone in those many cold dark filled nights – too many to even count. There is and was so much love in your sharing and it was felt in that hospital room- clutching a heating pad for any type warmth – sleeping on a plastic sofa next to someone suffering and unable to express what you both were going through at almost the exact same time. It gave him a voice and filled that huge cavity of fear that was taking over my soul. So many times reading your words and saying – OMG she is saying it so Im not crazy- Im not alone – God sent that site to me and I dont even know how I found it– although you both had blood cancers. We Many times wondered how is our beautiful Elana? I have been blessed by a God that sent that site to me – and had what I truly believe – the hand in the grace that we didn’t deserve to be given – to be one of the ones that had the chance to live again – still here with you – both of us alive to read this joyful news that- it worked – and we are not alone and unloved- and I too will sign up to match us . Thank you- thank you – thank you and know – we have prayed for you and thought of you more than we can count .
Elana, How beautiful is is to read your words, then read the loving responses from this tender community. Your writing has given me a sense of hope, connection, and courage. I am grateful.
Elena, I responded to your Instagram post before I read this. I am moved to tears. Thirty years ago, my 9 month old son was diagnosed with Stage III Neuroblastoma. His chances of survival were slim. At the time I got all my friends to join me and sign up for Be The Match, although I think it was called something different at the time. While I was never contacted, and now with Stage IV Lymphoma myself, I doubt I would be able to donate, I am so happy to hear you found a match. I am inspired by you every day. While my son miraculously survived, and is 31 now, I hope and pray the same for you. Please continue to post your stories. They have helped me in ways you can never imagine.
Thank you for your utter loveliness. I’ve followed you for years, and it’s only now, reading your ripple metaphor, that I realize I should shake a drop into the pool with my own thanks. I appreciate you, your vulnerability, and your humanity. Sending lots of love.
Thank you for being you! Your energy is felt!
Your former UCLA MARC Facilitator
“I choose to take my chaos and construct meaning from it, to create coherence, to become whole through telling a story.” Dear Elana, Your writing is achingly beautiful, poignant and profound. By the end I was brought to tears, in just the way only powerful writing can move the soul. As someone who has been through a significant health crisis at a young age and has also grappled with faith and how to form meaning from suffering, you have expressed feelings that I can fully integrate into my worldview. Your life is indeed a blessing to all those you touch. Thank you from a fellow therapist and Menlo grad.
Thank you for continuing to share your journey & yourself with me & us. I am grateful to be connected to you. Words are lacking. Continued best to you!
Thank you for sharing your beautiful story of universal love and the reminder we are all connected.