Aibu to feel like this about organ donation?

[frizzfactor]

So a little back story. My father died very suddenly in my late teens. When he was buried the idea of him not being 'complete' was totally abhorrent.

Up until his death, I had thought I would always donate all my organs, but now I'm horribly struggling with the idea. I will be 40 in a little while and live in an area where you actively have to opt out of doing so.

I totally get that my decrepit and abused organs could potentially save a life, but the thought of being harvested and disposed of by some means (don't even get me started on that one!) horrifies me. I would like to find peace with this so any help greatly appreciated. However I also want to know if anyone else feel this way or am I being totally unreasonable?!?

I donated my husband's corneas after his death. It didn't occur to me that organ donation would be possible as he had cancer and I would really like people to know that it is - the organ donation people just had some questions about the kind of cancer and chemotherapy he had.

They were able to use his corneas for two young men and also tissue that could be saved for people who have eye injuries. It was difficult to think of the actual operation, but has been a huge comfort to think of those young men who can see more clrealy now. I waited a while to tell my little boys but then the subject came up and they took it in their stride. One of their teachers said that my youngest son had even brought it up in class, telling everyone how proud he was of his dad. The transplant people also sent a letter to mum boys at my request to help explain it to them. I would encourage anyone to consider it. It's a wonderful gift.

I donate blood and am on the Anthony Nolan register. I will also donate my eggs once I've had another baby... These are all parts of my body that I can spare and can help other people.

Everyone in my family knows my feelings on organ donation. I hope that science has progressed to such an extent that by the time I die they can use so much if my body that what's left fits in a shoe box (pipe dream I know). I will be dead, if helping keep others alive or improving their health with bits of my body then I'm happy.

I think we should have an opt out system and by opting out you are also opting out of ever receiving an organ.

If you would accept an organ then you nerd to be OK with donating one I think.

It gave me comfort to know that two other families were able to avoid the hell we were going through as a result of orphan donation when a family tragedy forced this issue upon us recently. When we had seen the heartbreak of early death up close, it was unthinkable to us that anyone else should go through it for the sake of something that we would never see or feel the loss of. And giving has its own healing reward; the thought that other families were escaping grief, were able to hold their children close, laugh and feel sunlight on their skin and would honour the memory of the person we loved. What better legacy and reminder that hope comes out of darkness?

need

If you'd take an organ you should be prepared to donate yours.

Think about how you'd feel if someone you loved died while waiting for an organ. It won't matter to you what happens to your organs. You'll be dead.

I agree. I don't really understand why you 'want' your organs after you're dead? What use are they to you then? The idea of clinging onto something that I no longer need or use, and allowing it to decompose or be incinerated, when it could save the life of a living and much-loved person seems ludicrous.

Fair play to you for starting the thread, OP.

I must admit, I feel far more squeamish about what's involved in the cremation process - and even more horrified by the prospect of being buried and rotting.

The thought of me a). living on, b). saving someone's life, and c). making a group of people so happy about b). far outweighs anything else.

I am an organ donor, and a blood donor, too. I got a text from our blood service last week when my last donation was given to someone, and the amazing feeling you get is second to none. I realise there would be no nice feeling post organ donation, due to being dead, but it's part and parcel of why I want to do it.

I think if you would be prepared to accept an organ donation for you or your children, you have to be prepared to donate yours too. Anything else is very unreasonable. I mean, in general, I think it's unfair to say "I'd rather someone else died than I had to feel squeamish" but I'm slightly less condemnatory if you're actually walking the walk.

The thing is though, the donor dies anyway. You're not going out with a hacksaw harvesting organs from the living (unless you're my sister, of course grin)

The living truth for the donating family is that their loved one looks alive; good colour, warm ( while objectively dead) right up until they wheel them out for the..er..harvest.
When you see their poor, pale dead self after the reaping, it's heart-rending.

And yes, they use a version of a hacksaw. Probably motorised.

My grandad donated his body to medical science.
For me the difficult part has been dealing with his absence in my life, not what happened to his body after he died. We got ashes, and we've had ceremonies etc, just as we would have done without his donation.
The only real difference was that we had the interment a year after his death because we had to wait to receive the ashes back. In some ways though, it was lovely, because it was a ceremony filled with real joy and love - we had all gone past the immediate grief and there were almost no tears at the ceremony, just a lot of loving memories and laughter.
He was a wonderful man and I adored him, and I love to think that his final wonderful act was to help others, either a doctor learn, or science as a whole learn something new.
He couldn't have been an organ donator but the idea that other families may have had futures together because of him would have been equally amazing.

Someone said upthread that there would be grieving families either way. Without organ donation, there may be 7 or 8 grieving families, having lost children, aunts, dads etc. With organ donation, it's just one. It's one too many and it's no less hideous for them, but many people could be spared the grief.

I'm not religious. I don't believe in any kind of afterlife. I believe what we have here and now is all we have. It's absolutely amazing, this thing called life, but it's fragile, and we all only get one very brief shot at it. So my belief is everyone deserves the best shot possible. And so you need to be kind to others etc, not because you are laying foundations for a great afterlife, but because you are trying to give everyone a chance to have a great life. And as organ donation is possible, then it's one way of making sure that someone else can carry on having their shot at life when mine is over. Because otherwise my organs will just be cremated and go to waste, I won't know or care anyway, and others will also lose out on their chance.

The thing is feelings are feelings and not always rational. Everyone is well wit hint their rights to feel weird. It's what you do next that counts, and deciding it's irrational and trying to explore those feelings that is a very brave step.

You don't have to look at them immediately after the procedure, if you don't want to see them looking like that.

So because you die-potentially other people and children must die too because they haven't received a donor?

There's a ridiculous shortage of organs.

Surely donation is something positive?

Yabu

echt that's the same when anyone dies.. one minute they look alive, the next they look dead whether there's donation involved or not. You don't see where they cut them open unless you actively look for it

YABU. You will be dead you won't need them, and quite frankly won't even know.
Those who choose to selfishly opt out shouldn't be able to accept an organ should they themselves need it.

Why do people think doctors would let someone die so that they could harvest the organs when the point of harvesting organs is to help people live ?

echt - that's exactly what I struggle with. That's why I can say easily that I don't mind them taking my organs, but I cannot bear the thought of DS being wheeled in to theatre whilst his body is still alive. I just can't. Consciously making the decision of not being there when my baby's (even though he's 12) heart beats for the final time? Couldn't do it.

I feel very strongly about organ donation because my mum is a donor recipient who would've died otherwise.
DP, DP's and I are all registered donors and have been for years (I registered DC's when I registered them with the GP after they were born).
Personally I feel knowing some good has come from a loss is very comforting.

Oh, and to those folks worried that if they're a registered donor then Dr's might not try so hard to save them: it doesn't work like that. The organ donor team are completely separate from the team treating you for that exact reason; to avoid conflicts or interest and to avoid people worrying about conflicts of interest.

Also as others have said, I think it's morally wrong to refuse to donate if you would accept and organ. And to be honest, even if you currently think you wouldn't accept an organ it's likely you may feel different if faced with the cold hard reality of death as an alternative.

Potentially tmi but my experience Echt was that my brother did not look alive any more prior to the 'harvest'. He was pallid and completely non-reactive. His breathing was artificial through a respirator. I saw him and saw that he was gone, and then we were told that he was brain stem dead. For those worrying that doctors may do less to help revive people so that their organs can be donated, when it comes to it I think it's clear cut whether someone is going to survive or not.

m.youtube.com/watch?v=TeVLxcekEsw

scaryteacher

Pluto I have no issues strangely, with live donation, as one hopes in the UK at least, it is done with free and informed consent.

There's no difference, organ donation after death is also done with full consent by either the family or the person themselves :) If the system was opt out it would be the same, you'd have the option to keep all your bits and bobs if you felt strongly about it but it would also stop the problem of people never getting round to signing up for donation and not expressing their wishes to their families.

I gave my sister my kidney when I was 15, my Mum and Dad and cousins, Grandparents and everyone else got tested but I was the best match. Back then I didn't even think twice about it, I was out of hospital after a week or so and back to normal after a couple of months :) I think it's the same with the death thing, if it was a family member who needed an organ and you were alive and able to donate you'd do it in a heartbeat, so I think personally it's a no brainer that the same should apply after death :)

You don't have to look at them immediately after the procedure, if you don't want to see them looking like that. hmm

Yes, I get it Dowager, but it still doesn't alter the effect on the donor family, which is what I was trying to get across.

echt that's the same when anyone dies.. one minute they look alive, the next they look dead whether there's donation involved or not. You don't see where they cut them open unless you actively look for it hmm

pluto Upthread I made it plain that I did take personal responsibility for what I looked at. And no, I've seen my DB die before me and in no way, even half an hour later did he look anything like my poor husband's bled-out body after donation. Still warm, since you asked.

And fuck right off with your

Milk, thank you for getting it.

blitheringbuzzards because of this thread, I watched a documentary on organ donation last night. They said for major organs like the heart and liver they don't accept organs over the age of 65 but they will accept kidneys and tissue from any age. The woman who donated organs in this programme was 65 and they took her heart, liver and kidneys and they said her organs were in extremely good condition for her age and her heart was like a 20 year old's! Which is unusual because over 65 they said most people will have mild heart disease. Anyway, her heart got donated to a 16 year old.

The whole process was fascinating and considering they only have 4-6 hours to transplant a heart before it deteriorates the pressure the teams are under is immense. I don't understand what the OP means by being disposed of because this woman was treated like any normal dead person, they showed them performing the last offices on her and washing her hair etc. once the donation was finished. And then her body was released to be taken to the funeral parlour, so it was no different to anyone else. She'd said specifically when she was alive that she wanted her organs to be donated and that she believed organs were just lent to us whilst we're alive, and when we die we can lend them to somebody else, which I thought was a really nice way of looking at it.

I'm on the organ donor register although I was told by an organ donor specialist that it's the relatives who ultimately decide and they can overrule it. So really it's not your decision at all.

Mycat one of the perils of teaching A level is reading around the subject. This jme.bmj.com/content/31/7/406.full might explain what i meant.

Thank you for all the constructive thoughts and comments. I debated a lot about posting this and thought I would open myself to a huge onslaught, however I think it's a conversation that needs to be had because I can't be the only one who feels this way.

I spoke to DS this morning about it and when I asked him if he would like his organs donated he said. 'Well obviously, I can't use them and I can save loads of lives.' He's 8.

I have gained a lot of comfort hearing the stories of recipients and understanding from the stories of relatives of donors, so thank you. I think whilst I still struggle with the thought of it, I will make sure I am registered.

Including my eyes

I see it as my body and my soul being completely different. When I'm dead I wont need my body.

Good on yer, frizz.

A chap I see when walking the dog, his wife is waiting for a liver transplant, and he heartily expressed his gratitude for my DH's donation, and especially its being made public, as every little bit helps.

DH's liver was tossed back by the surgeons as too enjoyed for further use. :o