Latest / The Central Indiana Sports Report / Cliff Hawkins & Kidney Donor Kira Newkirk (Co-Host: Michelle Garmon; Podcast No. 332.1)

Transcript

Cliff Hawkins & Kidney Donor Kira Newkirk (Co-Host: Michelle Garmon; Podcast No. 332.1) · The Central Indiana Sports Report

• 0:00
  [SPEAKER_06]: What you are listening to now is a special edition of the Central Indiana Sport Group for podcast number three hundred and thirty two point one.
• 0:12
  [SPEAKER_06]: Former Trice Central Antipton Head Coach, also the Calb and Madison.
• 0:17
  [SPEAKER_06]: Among others, Cliff Hawkins and his kidney donor, Kira Newcurth.
• 0:23
  [SPEAKER_06]: Special co-host, Michelle Garmin of the Tipton Tribune and Elwood Collier.
• 0:29
  [SPEAKER_06]: It was a great ninety minutes.
• 0:31
  [SPEAKER_06]: Please enjoy.
• 0:43
  [SPEAKER_01]: Your visit to the Central Indiana Sports Report with your host, Greg Midgales.
• 0:52
  [SPEAKER_06]: Welcome to a special Central Indiana Sports Report here.
• 0:56
  [SPEAKER_06]: and downtown fissures today at Cafe Patitude.
• 0:59
  [SPEAKER_06]: Did I say that right?
• 1:01
  [SPEAKER_00]: You did.
• 1:01
  [SPEAKER_06]: With former Tipton Head Coach Cliff Hawkins and Kira New Creek for a special podcast and Michelle Garmin of the Tipton Tribunal would call leader is also here with me.
• 1:14
  [SPEAKER_06]: She is going to take control of the interview.
• 1:18
  [SPEAKER_06]: Welcome Michelle.
• 1:19
  [SPEAKER_03]: Thank you, Gray.
• 1:19
  [SPEAKER_03]: I'm happy to be here.
• 1:22
  [SPEAKER_03]: For those of you that don't know the backstory or may have read it and
• 1:27
  [SPEAKER_03]: kind of forget Cliff resigned from the tipten coaching job because he was receiving a new kidney on April eight.
• 1:35
  [SPEAKER_03]: And that kidney came from Cara, Cara, New Kirk, who is a former student of Cliffs and has more ties than that.
• 1:42
  [SPEAKER_03]: So first, I'm going to let Cara introduce herself and kind of give you her background on that.
• 1:48
  [SPEAKER_03]: And then we'll go to Cliffs and he can tell retail a little bit about his story.
• 1:52
  [SPEAKER_03]: So Cara, go ahead.
• 1:53
  [SPEAKER_00]: Hi, yeah, my name's Cara New Kirk and I am the vice president for Indiana Donner Network.
• 1:58
  [SPEAKER_00]: I've been working with Indian Adorno Network for seven years now, and so donation and transplantation is my passion.
• 2:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: My background, I am a registered nurse, and so I've been in critical care nursing, my entire career as a nurse, but have spent the last seven years in donation and transplantation.
• 2:21
  [SPEAKER_03]: So when you said critical care nurse, then have you worked?
• 2:23
  [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, when you did some of that, that nursing where are you working with donor patients?
• 2:30
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I spent probably four or five years in the pediatric ICU at Methodist Hospital here in downtown Indianapolis.
• 2:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so, unfortunately, I saw a lot of tragic events that led to children becoming organ donors.
• 2:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: Probably one of the most tragic things that you could think about is losing a child.
• 2:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: But those families who said yes to donation saw their children's legacy live on through the recipients of their organs and to the one.
• 3:07
  [SPEAKER_00]: more than one, absolutely.
• 3:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: And they just, um, what donation meant to them?
• 3:14
  [SPEAKER_00]: I saw, um,
• 3:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: how they process their grief.
• 3:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: It meant that it gave purpose to the loss of their child of someone living their life.
• 3:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: Certainly, anybody would change the outcome of losing a child.
• 3:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: But the legacy that donation gives to that family and their loved one that they lost is just incredible.
• 3:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I've witnessed
• 3:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: So many amazing stories that have come out of someone giving the ultimate gift of work and donation.
• 3:50
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so that's why I just, this is my passion.
• 3:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: This is my life's mission is to continue to advocate for it.
• 3:59
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so professionally I do it.
• 4:01
  [SPEAKER_00]: And now personally, that has all come, you know, connected.
• 4:07
  [SPEAKER_03]: So tell us when you first met Cliff,
• 4:11
  [SPEAKER_03]: and how you got to, well, thirty years ago.
• 4:16
  [SPEAKER_03]: You know, thirty years ago.
• 4:18
  [SPEAKER_03]: I don't know.
• 4:20
  [SPEAKER_03]: Because you guys could see here and I'll take a picture here before we leave and great can run in on the background of the podcast.
• 4:26
  [SPEAKER_03]: She will understand.
• 4:27
  [SPEAKER_03]: She looks like thirty years ago.
• 4:29
  [SPEAKER_03]: She would have been a toddler, okay?
• 4:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: Oh gosh.
• 4:32
  [SPEAKER_00]: You guys are way too kind and I am using my sunscreen appropriately now.
• 4:37
  [SPEAKER_00]: So hopefully that is what the work is.
• 4:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: No, you know, when you think about being a thirteen year old kid and not realizing thirty years later, the impact that you're going to make in someone's life.
• 4:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: unfathomable.
• 4:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: You just don't think about that as a kid.
• 4:58
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, I have an almost eleven year old and to like to think about like, he could go on to save one of this teacher's life.
• 5:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like, you know, our story is here today.
• 5:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, I was a kid in a small community that was super tight knit.
• 5:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: We took care of each other.
• 5:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: Clif.
• 5:22
  [SPEAKER_00]: was the head Auburn Indiana.
• 5:25
  [SPEAKER_00]: Cliff was a head coach of our boys basketball team and also a teacher educator at the high school.
• 5:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so he actually had stepped in when the girls basketball team didn't have head coach at the time to run a summer camp for us.
• 5:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so that was my first exposure to Cliff and his son is two years older than me and his daughter is two years younger than me.
• 5:53
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so, you know, we all just kind of ran around together.
• 5:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: I was in and out of his house unbeknownst to really kind of him.
• 6:00
  [SPEAKER_00]: He just always had a gaggle of kids that were kind of coming in and out and there.
• 6:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: Clip and his wife, Julie, we're just always so welcoming and loved community and loved kids.
• 6:13
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so, and that's really kind of where our story started is I was just a kid going to high school and never ever in my dreams.
• 6:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: Did I think that our story would find each other again, or lives would connect again, thirty years later.
• 6:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so,
• 6:35
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's just so awesome and speaks to a developing community where you're from and how do you stay connected to people and then when you have the opportunity to help someone that you take action.
• 6:52
  [SPEAKER_03]: Now we're going to go to Coach Cliff Hawkins, and I'm going to let Cliff introduce himself.
• 6:56
  [SPEAKER_03]: And he can talk first about his last stop was Tipton, where I'm going to let him start and talk about the places he's coached.
• 7:04
  [SPEAKER_03]: And then we'll go into what he found out he needed a kidney and how all that went on.
• 7:12
  [SPEAKER_03]: So go ahead Coach.
• 7:13
  [SPEAKER_06]: I found out a little earlier that he was a cascade cadet is where it all began.
• 7:18
  [SPEAKER_02]: And that's where I started.
• 7:19
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yes, like it moved from Ohio to Indiana.
• 7:22
  [SPEAKER_02]: And it became a cascade to that.
• 7:25
  [SPEAKER_02]: And my first statement was George McGinnis and Steve Downing.
• 7:28
  [SPEAKER_02]: So you can imagine what that was all about with the Indianapolis Washington Continental.
• 7:33
  [SPEAKER_02]: But first before I start, I just want to thank both of you for having us today because it means a lot to cure and I to be able
• 7:44
  [SPEAKER_02]: to tell our story and possibly give hope to anyone that's out there wanting to receive, hoping to receive a kidney and also to those that maybe are considering being a donor and realized that the two people that are involved in this process are sitting side by side today talking to you so it really can happen but
• 8:11
  [SPEAKER_02]: I've had an unbelievable career in Indiana.
• 8:15
  [SPEAKER_02]: I did coach at a lot of different schools and part of the reason was when we first started out, we didn't have class basketball.
• 8:24
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so my goal at that time was always to coach like I was going to be there forever.
• 8:30
  [SPEAKER_02]: Teach like I was going to be there forever.
• 8:34
  [SPEAKER_02]: always keep in mind that maybe there could be something else available and sometimes when you start small and I started at Caston I was a JD coach one year and the next next year I was the head coach.
• 8:46
  [SPEAKER_02]: And then I had an opportunity to go with Bill Hodges at Indiana State.
• 8:50
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I got my master's degree all in one year with the summers on each end, and I got to coach college basketball.
• 8:57
  [SPEAKER_02]: But I did come to a reality one day, laying on the only piece of grass that time at Indiana State.
• 9:04
  [SPEAKER_02]: It used to be all sidewalks.
• 9:06
  [SPEAKER_02]: But by the library, I laid down, and I thought, what I really want to do here, and it was, I wanted to work with young people.
• 9:14
  [SPEAKER_02]: So I really wanted to work and I really wanted to teach.
• 9:18
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so I made the decision
• 9:21
  [SPEAKER_02]: laying out in front of the library at the end of the state that I was going to get back into high school coaching.
• 9:27
  [SPEAKER_02]: And fortunately I got to come to Tipton County at that time and coach at Tri Central.
• 9:32
  [SPEAKER_02]: And of course in those days and I know this is always hard to talk about.
• 9:36
  [SPEAKER_02]: But I really was a Trojan and we were trying to beat the Tipton Blue Devils.
• 9:40
  [SPEAKER_02]: Okay.
• 9:42
  [SPEAKER_02]: But they were the worst one.
• 9:45
  [SPEAKER_06]: I was at all what they were all rivals to the table.
• 9:48
  [SPEAKER_06]: And they were so good at everything.
• 9:49
  [SPEAKER_03]: So Cliff was Dick Bar that is still the coach at Tipton when you first got there.
• 9:53
  [SPEAKER_02]: But I wanted to say Dick Bar treated me.
• 9:55
  [SPEAKER_02]: Here I was.
• 9:56
  [SPEAKER_02]: He was on the end of his career.
• 9:58
  [SPEAKER_02]: I was in the beginning of my career.
• 10:00
  [SPEAKER_02]: He would put his arm around me.
• 10:01
  [SPEAKER_02]: He welcomed me.
• 10:02
  [SPEAKER_02]: I went scouting one night.
• 10:04
  [SPEAKER_02]: He had me sit beside him right by the stage and tipped in and all the tipped in bands, nowhere that stage is.
• 10:10
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so I said, I'm going to scotch you tonight.
• 10:12
  [SPEAKER_02]: They were playing noblesville.
• 10:14
  [SPEAKER_02]: And he said, well, just why aren't you just sit behind the bench?
• 10:19
  [SPEAKER_02]: Okay, what coach tell somebody that you're going to play, but he just was that he treated me so well.
• 10:26
  [SPEAKER_02]: And Dick Bar was a legend at Tipton and he served there two times, had the number one ranked team in the state in nineteen sixty four or five.
• 10:37
  [SPEAKER_03]: They probably would have been a really good state contender that year because they'd beat the two teams at play for the state championship, but he lost the player and key starter Harvey Harman to an injury before the section.
• 10:49
  [SPEAKER_02]: Absolutely.
• 10:49
  [SPEAKER_02]: I know who was playing over at Lwood, too.
• 10:55
  [SPEAKER_02]: But so the career went on and I kept moving up and then it was Greenfield Okay, and from Greenfield then is when the greatest opportunity ever came so far and they were all good.
• 11:08
  [SPEAKER_02]: I love their were was but
• 11:11
  [SPEAKER_02]: we moved to DeCalm, and we never dreamed that we would move out of any an apples area to Auburn, but as soon as we drove through the town, as soon as we went to the school that had just been, they had done a modeling project on it, and as soon as I walked in the gym, there was just everything that made me feel like
• 11:34
  [SPEAKER_02]: I feel like I've been here forever and way back in the old days there was a coach there named Jim likes who had also coached at my high school after I was done and I knew him well and then Jan David at that time was still coaching and so I had been to to call the few times.
• 11:53
  [SPEAKER_02]: So the Caldas where Kira and I met and then from there we went a little bit bigger and that was center growth.
• 12:01
  [SPEAKER_02]: And then at that point I decided I was ready to kind of gear down a little bit with a little smaller program.
• 12:09
  [SPEAKER_02]: and went to a couple schools, but sometimes when you go into a smaller school, you might start in a certain job and you might end up doing a lot of different things.
• 12:19
  [SPEAKER_02]: At one point I was kind of an acting principal.
• 12:21
  [SPEAKER_02]: I didn't even have a license.
• 12:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: Other duties as a sign.
• 12:25
  [SPEAKER_02]: Other duties as a sign.
• 12:26
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I got to think it about that.
• 12:28
  [SPEAKER_02]: So, but fortunately for the end of my career, there's so many great things that happened.
• 12:37
  [SPEAKER_02]: I got to come to Tipton.
• 12:40
  [SPEAKER_02]: That was a homecoming as well because you know there were some of my former players around There was Cory for none who was in my camp of champions when he went to try central and he was my athletic record.
• 12:55
  [SPEAKER_02]: I remember him at high school and his dad had been a very good player
• 12:59
  [SPEAKER_02]: His dad had been my athletic director at Tricecenter.
• 13:01
  [SPEAKER_02]: I don't even thought a thing about it of coming to tipped him, but it just all worked out.
• 13:06
  [SPEAKER_02]: So that's kind of how I got to tipped him.
• 13:09
  [SPEAKER_02]: And lots of nice things happened there.
• 13:13
  [SPEAKER_02]: But one of the greatest things that ever happened that occurred was from my past when I received information that there was possibly a donor in the registry.
• 13:33
  [SPEAKER_03]: But if you were at Tipton when you got the diagnosis about your meeting at Kidney, correct?
• 13:38
  [SPEAKER_02]: So the first year coaching been Hummer cows and all those guys, they weren't great.
• 13:44
  [SPEAKER_02]: But I noticed as I moved into February of that year, that first year, Tipton, two thousand nineteen and two thousand twenty.
• 13:54
  [SPEAKER_02]: So it was the spring of twenty-twenty just before COVID.
• 13:58
  [SPEAKER_02]: In February, I started to notice that
• 14:02
  [SPEAKER_02]: There, something wasn't exactly right, but I just kept, you know, I just kept going, you know.
• 14:09
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so COVID hit on March the thirteenth or fourteenth when they closed the schools, I came back to Greenwood because we still had our home there.
• 14:19
  [SPEAKER_02]: And that's when I started exercising strong because, you know, that's what you had to do.
• 14:25
  [SPEAKER_02]: There wasn't a lot to do during that time.
• 14:27
  [SPEAKER_06]: And I noticed, I lost almost fifty pounds.
• 14:30
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I was close.
• 14:33
  [SPEAKER_02]: But I tried to accelerate when I would walk and I noticed that it wasn't good.
• 14:39
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I knew I had a fiscal scheduled for May, but as of course as you know, they weren't really into that.
• 14:44
  [SPEAKER_02]: So what happened was I did get to do the blood test.
• 14:48
  [SPEAKER_02]: And that blood test definitely pointed out that I was in in-stage kidney disease.
• 14:55
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I didn't know.
• 14:56
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I lots of times older gentlemen will present in different ways that didn't happen to me.
• 15:05
  [SPEAKER_02]: It was just something that was kind of an anomaly of how it happened
• 15:11
  [SPEAKER_02]: But they immediately read my blood test and made a call and said you have to be in the emergency room within minutes.
• 15:20
  [SPEAKER_02]: I know these numbers won't mean anything to a lot of people if they don't have never heard of the word like I hadn't.
• 15:27
  [SPEAKER_02]: But they said your creatinine is eighteen point six and it's supposed to be about
• 15:33
  [SPEAKER_02]: one to one point five.
• 15:34
  [SPEAKER_02]: I was in severe trouble.
• 15:36
  [SPEAKER_02]: My potassium was out the wind and that's when you start to have Oregon shutdown.
• 15:40
  [SPEAKER_02]: So I'm in the emergency room and they told me that day that I wouldn't be able to leave the hospital without dialysis.
• 15:48
  [SPEAKER_02]: Well, COVID hit.
• 15:50
  [SPEAKER_02]: My wife was able to bring my computer.
• 15:53
  [SPEAKER_02]: So also I had to say to people at that time while I was trying to learn this because nobody could go in with me.
• 15:58
  [SPEAKER_02]: I didn't know any of the words or anything.
• 16:00
  [SPEAKER_02]: I had to learn all of this and then make phone calls.
• 16:02
  [SPEAKER_02]: But I was able to continue because when we started COVID we were pretty much giving us assignments as well we were doing.
• 16:09
  [SPEAKER_02]: So I was able to do that from my hospital bed and the only thing I was supposed to have a meeting on Zoom and that's when I had Julie call and say, if you're just allowed them to know,
• 16:20
  [SPEAKER_02]: that I currently have some kidney problems.
• 16:22
  [SPEAKER_02]: I'm not going to be able to attend the meeting.
• 16:24
  [SPEAKER_02]: And then after that is when I started to share, once I understood in stage kidney disease, because I didn't know what it meant, I just thought, you have kidney disease and you can get better.
• 16:35
  [SPEAKER_02]: But you need to list a chronic kidney disease as to keyword.
• 16:39
  [SPEAKER_02]: And that means you can't get better.
• 16:42
  [SPEAKER_02]: but you can prolong and do things to keep it going through possibly dialysis, which I didn't start to almost three and a half to four years later, because I did control it with diet and exercise.
• 16:55
  [SPEAKER_02]: I was able to get to creatinine down through how measures in the emergency room and so on, and not down where it should be, but down enough that I could walk out of the hospital.
• 17:07
  [SPEAKER_02]: And that's kind of where the story starts with I start going to a nephrologist and then get involved with a kidney donor program.
• 17:18
  [SPEAKER_03]: So you said you went, like, two, three years before you needed to go to the house.
• 17:21
  [SPEAKER_02]: I'm just three and a half to four, actually.
• 17:24
  [SPEAKER_03]: Now, and I know you were, you taught full time when you came to tip to tip to tip.
• 17:27
  [SPEAKER_02]: I was still teaching.
• 17:28
  [SPEAKER_02]: Okay.
• 17:29
  [SPEAKER_03]: So at what point that I know, then you kind of went to, was it kind of like, half, I mean, part-time teaching and then retired.
• 17:36
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, it was part-time teaching, but not coaching.
• 17:39
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, of the six years, I was two years full time.
• 17:42
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I had chronic kidney disease in that full-time year.
• 17:45
  [SPEAKER_02]: And that was kind of interesting to mix with basketball and know when to do my appointments and, you know, half sick days or personal days or whatever.
• 17:53
  [SPEAKER_02]: But it all worked.
• 17:55
  [SPEAKER_02]: And then the next year I was able to negotiate half time.
• 18:00
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so I would plan my appointments in those open gaps and still teach.
• 18:08
  [SPEAKER_02]: And then the last two years, I was able to negotiate.
• 18:11
  [SPEAKER_02]: I've been in the classroom for forty-four years.
• 18:14
  [SPEAKER_02]: I loved it, but it was best that I really could have a lot more flexibility, and it worked out perfectly.
• 18:21
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I really thank the Tipton
• 18:24
  [SPEAKER_02]: people, the administration, for allowing me that, because it allowed me to continue to live a normal life as much as I could through dialysis.
• 18:34
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I finally had to go on dialysis when my neurologist looked at me and said, Cliff, I can't go any further.
• 18:40
  [SPEAKER_02]: You may be sitting on the bench one day and ask, who's out there?
• 18:44
  [SPEAKER_02]: Okay, so he said, you're going to have to start, and that's kind of how this all began.
• 18:49
  [SPEAKER_02]: So when did you go on that?
• 18:51
  [SPEAKER_02]: the donor list.
• 18:52
  [SPEAKER_02]: Previous to going off of dialysis, I found it was able to get an appointment with the, um, the ascension, St.
• 19:05
  [SPEAKER_02]: Vincent ascension team transplant team.
• 19:09
  [SPEAKER_02]: In about, it was actually October, twenty-four.
• 19:14
  [SPEAKER_02]: Before I went off of dialysis down the road, it was a year and a half or so before I went off time.
• 19:19
  [SPEAKER_02]: So somewhere in twenty- twenty-three, I had that appointment in October.
• 19:24
  [SPEAKER_02]: And then I learned what I was going to have to do.
• 19:27
  [SPEAKER_02]: And there's many tests that you have to take.
• 19:30
  [SPEAKER_02]: And again, I encourage everyone to do them.
• 19:33
  [SPEAKER_02]: The team there is so helpful in trying to help you get the appointments that you have to stay on it.
• 19:43
  [SPEAKER_02]: Here I went through the same thing as she decided to become a donor.
• 19:47
  [SPEAKER_02]: Only had even a few more tests.
• 19:51
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so
• 19:54
  [SPEAKER_02]: Those were challenging times, but I believe it could happen.
• 20:00
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so, if it's necessary for me to keep working and doing what I do, and it was necessary for me to meet all the expectations of the team at St.
• 20:11
  [SPEAKER_02]: Vincent's.
• 20:11
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I told the players in the summer of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of,
• 20:23
  [SPEAKER_02]: in stage kidney disease.
• 20:27
  [SPEAKER_02]: I am handling it, and I will only talk to you the next time if something new has happened that you need to know, which was in April after the section.
• 20:38
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I maintain my truth.
• 20:42
  [SPEAKER_02]: And the reason was, I didn't want to come into the gym saying, how are you today?
• 20:46
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I could every day I was ready because, you know, I wasn't having to teach.
• 20:51
  [SPEAKER_02]: So every day I was ready to show them that regardless of your adversity, you can keep going.
• 20:57
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I think all of us in life have faced those challenges.
• 21:01
  [SPEAKER_03]: Well, I'll be honest with you.
• 21:03
  [SPEAKER_03]: Anyone that was watching you coach and see an honest, I would have never known if that you were going through what you were going through.
• 21:09
  [SPEAKER_06]: Because we interviewed you a couple of times no idea.
• 21:12
  [SPEAKER_03]: You know, but I mean, and you coach the same.
• 21:14
  [SPEAKER_03]: You stood up through the game.
• 21:15
  [SPEAKER_03]: You were out talking the time.
• 21:16
  [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, you never, it's like you never had to sit down and just like rest or turn anything over to your assistant.
• 21:22
  [SPEAKER_03]: You were at, um, a quick, after you found out you were having to go on the donor list.
• 21:27
  [SPEAKER_03]: Then did your, the members of your family start getting tested, did,
• 21:34
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, there was no match, believe it or not, within my family.
• 21:38
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I bet that was hard on them.
• 21:42
  [SPEAKER_02]: It was, but, you know, now the story is so much different because
• 21:51
  [SPEAKER_02]: You know, I have a very nice family.
• 21:53
  [SPEAKER_02]: I have lots of sisters.
• 21:56
  [SPEAKER_02]: No brothers.
• 21:58
  [SPEAKER_02]: But we've brought another daughter into our family.
• 22:03
  [SPEAKER_02]: Okay.
• 22:03
  [SPEAKER_02]: She fits right in between.
• 22:05
  [SPEAKER_02]: She's been there when Matt's visited.
• 22:07
  [SPEAKER_02]: She's been there when Megan's visited.
• 22:09
  [SPEAKER_02]: She came to my birthday party with my three sisters who have trouble hearing.
• 22:14
  [SPEAKER_02]: Okay.
• 22:15
  [SPEAKER_02]: And she's been so kind and she told me one day that
• 22:23
  [SPEAKER_02]: Never did she realize when she, I'm just going to use the word, gave up a kidney.
• 22:29
  [SPEAKER_02]: She would gain a family.
• 22:31
  [SPEAKER_03]: So, Cliff, what you, you, so, care found out about this because you went out and you shared your story.
• 22:41
  [SPEAKER_03]: You want to talk about that?
• 22:43
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I filled out my all the paper work and she then and she'll tell her part of filling out the first registrations.
• 22:54
  [SPEAKER_02]: So let me know that a lot of people had looked at my website but one person had registered and it gives you hope but you just keep going because you don't know who the person is and that's the right way to do it.
• 23:10
  [SPEAKER_02]: So as things unfolded besides the website, I realized that, you know, for whatever reason, part of it, I had kept so private at tips and because I didn't want people to bear a burden of anything or feel badly, I knew there, I had to keep my focus and keep going.
• 23:31
  [SPEAKER_02]: But I quickly realized that you do have to be your own advocate.
• 23:36
  [SPEAKER_02]: And sometimes others can be your advocate for you as well, but you have to be your own advocate.
• 23:43
  [SPEAKER_02]: So in the summertime, about a year ago now, one of my former assistant coaches, brothers had passed, and there was going to be a memorial service that evening, one of the nights of that week.
• 24:00
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so what I did,
• 24:01
  [SPEAKER_02]: I called a former player of my who is a dentist in Auburn.
• 24:06
  [SPEAKER_02]: His name is Andy Schmitt.
• 24:08
  [SPEAKER_02]: His father was my dentist when I was an Auburn.
• 24:11
  [SPEAKER_02]: You know, very for none, Cory for none.
• 24:13
  [SPEAKER_02]: Andy Schmitt, Dan Schmitt, okay.
• 24:16
  [SPEAKER_02]: His father had been my dentist, but I just asked Andy if I could arrive around four o'clock and if we could have just a few minutes to talk.
• 24:26
  [SPEAKER_02]: And when I got there, Andy knew I had been on dialysis.
• 24:30
  [SPEAKER_02]: I had shared that at one point with him.
• 24:33
  [SPEAKER_02]: And he just asked me how it was going.
• 24:35
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I said, I need to talk with you a little bit.
• 24:40
  [SPEAKER_02]: I'm not here to ask you for your kidney.
• 24:43
  [SPEAKER_02]: But I am here to ask you to tell my story.
• 24:47
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so I went back through it all because, you know, he's busy in his life, he has children, he's a wonderful family.
• 24:54
  [SPEAKER_02]: You know, he's having to keep things figured out.
• 24:57
  [SPEAKER_02]: But I went ahead and kind of shared what we've done here so far.
• 25:01
  [SPEAKER_02]: And Andy looked at me and he said, Coach, I'll tell you your story.
• 25:05
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I said, you know Andy, you don't have to have a meeting.
• 25:07
  [SPEAKER_02]: It can just be casual.
• 25:09
  [SPEAKER_02]: So he went to play golf with two of my former players at the Cal.
• 25:15
  [SPEAKER_02]: And one was Mike Chrisner and the other was Grant Stupac.
• 25:21
  [SPEAKER_02]: Grant Stupac happens to go with Kira.
• 25:26
  [SPEAKER_02]: But we didn't know any of that.
• 25:29
  [SPEAKER_02]: So I'm saying to, you know, Andy, they're done playing golf and they're standing in the driveway.
• 25:35
  [SPEAKER_02]: And he says, did you guys realize Coach Hawkins needs a kidney?
• 25:39
  [SPEAKER_02]: And they didn't.
• 25:41
  [SPEAKER_02]: And he said, so Grant really zebraed in on that mess.
• 25:47
  [SPEAKER_02]: He's because obviously Kira works for the Indiana donor network.
• 25:52
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so when he got back to see her that evening, he mentioned it.
• 25:56
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I think this is probably where it's really good for Kira to start because this is how it goes to us about what went through your mind and when he told you what went through your mind and then what your steps what you did.
• 26:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, you know grant
• 26:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, came back from that golf tournament that day and was like, hey, did you know Coach Hawkins needs a kidney transplant?
• 26:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: And it was probably something along the lines of, how hard do you think you could do something about that?
• 26:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: Because of, you know, working for Indiana, don't know that word.
• 26:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: And by the way, I cannot.
• 26:36
  [SPEAKER_00]: I cannot affect anybody's status on the transplant wait list.
• 26:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: Uh, and so I'm gonna have zero pull in that.
• 26:45
  [SPEAKER_00]: I absolutely am.
• 26:47
  [SPEAKER_03]: And we are gonna stress that so she doesn't get deluge with phone calls that people know clear what everyone's saying.
• 26:52
  [SPEAKER_03]: Hey, can you help me?
• 26:53
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I've had people, I've had people actually ask me that.
• 26:58
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, so, but, you know, that cliff is someone from my hometown.
• 27:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: And this was not the first time that I have been, um, you know,
• 27:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: What's the work that I do?
• 27:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: I hear a lot about people who are waiting for an organ and sometimes that comes from people that I know in the community, from various places that I've lived and worked.
• 27:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so it's not the first time that I've known someone who has needed an organ transplant.
• 27:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: This time was a little bit different.
• 27:36
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, I've always
• 27:39
  [SPEAKER_00]: felt like when I when that you know that ask has been there is is someone needs a kidney transplant could I always ask myself could I do that could I donate a kidney and I think when when people are thinking about that they think I would absolutely do it for a family member
• 27:59
  [SPEAKER_00]: hands down no matter the time, but when you're donating altruistically, you're thinking about, is this the right time for me?
• 28:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: And, you know, previously I had a small child.
• 28:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: I had started a new job, this that another, you know, life events, you know, kind of Trump being able to go through with a living donation.
• 28:21
  [SPEAKER_03]: And she's not to think about your own future.
• 28:23
  [SPEAKER_03]: What happens if you're to your remaining kid, if something happens to you?
• 28:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: Sure.
• 28:27
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 28:28
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 28:28
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, to be a living kidney donor comes with a lot of consideration.
• 28:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: And sometimes, you know, when a family member needs that you, uh, you are like, absolutely, I will do whatever I can to help a family member.
• 28:43
  [SPEAKER_00]: When you're doing it all terrifically, you think about a lot of different things.
• 28:48
  [SPEAKER_00]: Um,
• 28:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: as, you know, what is my health going to be like, I have a child.
• 28:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: What if they need a kidney?
• 28:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: All these things, you know, you have to consider.
• 28:59
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so I believe timing lined up.
• 29:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: There were a series of events that led me to believe that this was the right time.
• 29:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I was in a good place in my career.
• 29:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: in my family life and my social life.
• 29:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'm healthy.
• 29:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: I am not getting younger.
• 29:22
  [SPEAKER_00]: So that now was a time and I said, you know, why not just try?
• 29:30
  [SPEAKER_00]: Just for going through the process doesn't commit you to doing the donation.
• 29:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: There's lots of things that you have to make sure you're medically eligible.
• 29:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: They're not going to put your life and jeopardy to become a living donor if they don't think that you will have the same quality of life after donation.
• 29:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: So they're just not going to put your life at risk.
• 30:00
  [SPEAKER_06]: at all.
• 30:01
  [SPEAKER_06]: And if you do have complications with your other kidney, you become a, you're, go to the top of the list for.
• 30:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I do get priority in, in the wait list because I have, I have given that, um, that gift.
• 30:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: So yes, so there is that, you know, I'm not been a person to live in what ifs.
• 30:27
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so you don't know what's gonna happen in the future.
• 30:30
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I had the opportunity to detect someone's life right now.
• 30:35
  [SPEAKER_00]: And that's what I chose to do.
• 30:36
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I know that is not how everybody thinks, you know?
• 30:41
  [SPEAKER_06]: I'm saying to the people who are concerned that if they give up a kidney, what if I have a problem with my remaining kidney?
• 30:49
  [SPEAKER_06]: There's some reassurance to that.
• 30:50
  [SPEAKER_00]: There's some reassurance.
• 30:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, you're going to go through medical care.
• 30:53
  [SPEAKER_00]: Certainly it is a risk.
• 30:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: I have, you know, if something does happen, I have one kidney and but it's not something that I think about an I dwell on or anything like that.
• 31:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's a, you know, it's something that you have to consider.
• 31:08
  [SPEAKER_00]: But the chances of me
• 31:12
  [SPEAKER_00]: And someone else who would be eligible to donate that would progress to a chronic kidney disease and meeting transplant is a really, really low percentage.
• 31:27
  [SPEAKER_00]: It will probably will not happen that I will, you know, end up in chronic kidney failure.
• 31:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: Um, ever, you know, with one or two kidneys.
• 31:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: So, and that's why it made me a good candidate of being able to donate to clubs.
• 31:43
  [SPEAKER_03]: Tell us what kind of series of tests.
• 31:46
  [SPEAKER_03]: How long was the process on your end to know that you
• 31:50
  [SPEAKER_03]: It would be an eligible donor.
• 31:52
  [SPEAKER_03]: Like for Cliff, I mean, what series of tests and things did you have to go through?
• 31:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 31:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: Well, one, you have to see what, see if your kidney, your kidneys are functioning at a level that you could donate.
• 32:07
  [SPEAKER_00]: So it was urine test.
• 32:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: It was blood test.
• 32:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: And once you kind of go through those initial testing of, okay,
• 32:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: Do I have got enough kidney function to support my life just in general?
• 32:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: Just at the way I am, do I have enough kidney function to maintain the quality of life with one kidney?
• 32:30
  [SPEAKER_00]: And then once you get to that step, then you go on to diagnostic testing where they're looking at the imaging of your kidneys.
• 32:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: Do you have correct anatomy?
• 32:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, because a lot of people live with some type of
• 32:46
  [SPEAKER_00]: like congenital abnormality in their kidneys, which is completely fine for that, but it makes transplant difficult.
• 32:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: You have to have your arteries and your veins and all those things, all those connection points in good status to be able to be transplanted.
• 33:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so we went to so then I moved to the diagnostic phase looking at the anatomy, the pictures of my kidney, is it the right size for cliff because, you know, if.
• 33:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, a cliff was a six-five, you know, three-hundred-pound man.
• 33:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: All that time?
• 33:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: All that time?
• 33:27
  [SPEAKER_06]: Where she'd been six-five when you were one last-of-all, but then you weren't really happy about that.
• 33:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, my kidney probably wouldn't be able to support his body frame.
• 33:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: So we, so the donor and the recipient have to be a compatible size.
• 33:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: Then we have to be a compatible blood type and antibodies.
• 33:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so it is a series of testing.
• 33:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: I started it in November and due to Thanksgiving and Christmas and New Year's, I think all of our testing was pretty much wrapped up by the end of January.
• 34:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: For you know you were doing this, he didn't know you were
• 34:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: He didn't know it.
• 34:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: So, yeah, so part of the story is I I was getting tested for him anonymously.
• 34:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: I didn't tell any of my family either.
• 34:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: The degree and the grant did not know.
• 34:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I didn't even tell Grant until probably mid December when I was having to go for one of the really long testing days.
• 34:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I was like, well, maybe I should tell him what I'm actually doing.
• 34:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: Going through this is a very personal decision and my way is not the best way for anybody, but one, I'm fairly educated in in donation and transplantation and so my choice to do this anonymously kind of from everybody was because I wanted to isolate this decision to make sure I was making this decision.
• 35:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: with out a lot of extraneous noise of either people being super positive about it like oh my gosh you're like I can't believe you're doing it or you know the negative of how could you do this like what about your health what about another family member what if what if what if it's because they are your parents afraid of something happening to you during surgery correct all the worries that everybody else has for you I wanted to be in a bubble that I knew
• 35:35
  [SPEAKER_00]: I was making the most educated and informed decision that I could and I knew I had the support of my family.
• 35:46
  [SPEAKER_00]: I knew I had the support of all my colleagues because that's what they do.
• 35:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: I really needed to know that
• 35:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: What I was doing, I was doing it for the right reason that it felt good to me and without any pressure, I knew that if I had talked to Cliff and
• 36:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: We connected before I told him that I registered that no matter what I would a hundred percent want to donate to Cliff just because of who he is, but I needed I needed that bubble to make sure that it was right for me without any other noise around it.
• 36:34
  [SPEAKER_03]: So when did you find out that you were a match for Cliff?
• 36:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: It was probably mid-January, after all the tissue typing done was done.
• 36:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: And, um, me, uh, blood tests were done.
• 36:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think Cliff probably found out a little bit later than that.
• 36:50
  [SPEAKER_00]: I was in the know a little bit more before Cliff was because really when you're a living donor,
• 36:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: You have a lot of control over the process of, you know, when are you gonna do the next steps?
• 37:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: They really make sure you're doing it without co-version, coercion, coercion.
• 37:12
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so, I knew, and then I had to, once I knew I was a match, then I had to say, okay, what are the next steps of letting Cliff know that we were a match?
• 37:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: And really, there's a lot of information, and even being an educated healthcare provider that absolutely knows the ins and outs of donation, transplantation, there were still some factors that I didn't quite understand.
• 37:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: If yes, we were a good blood match, but we had some price sensitivity towards antibodies.
• 37:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so in my experience, I was thinking, well, does that not make us a good match?
• 37:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so,
• 37:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: Then I was thinking, okay, are we should I donate on behalf of Cliff and donate to someone else and move him up the list so he gets a better match.
• 38:08
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so there was some decision making in our process.
• 38:12
  [SPEAKER_00]: So that is an option.
• 38:14
  [SPEAKER_00]: So if you don't
• 38:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: So if you're wanting to donate to someone, but yet you're not a match, you can actually donate on behalf of that person and reduce their weight.
• 38:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: So if I were to donate to someone else on behalf of Cliff, then that would have reduced his weight.
• 38:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think they said between six to twelve months, he would have
• 38:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: It would have reduced his weight for a kidney.
• 38:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so, but I had to ask questions, just like Cliff said, like you have to be your own advocate.
• 38:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: If you don't understand something, you need to keep asking questions.
• 38:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I needed to continue to ask questions and feel good about
• 38:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: Where is my kidney going?
• 38:59
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so I absolutely would.
• 39:01
  [SPEAKER_00]: If we weren't a great match, I would have absolutely donated on his behalf, but then I wouldn't have known.
• 39:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: the recipient at all, which is okay, is okay.
• 39:14
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's one of the facets of donations, but my intention was to donate to cliff.
• 39:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so I really had to understand our level of compatibility, what risk was it for cliff?
• 39:28
  [SPEAKER_00]: And is that something that
• 39:32
  [SPEAKER_00]: I was willing to accept because once you donate your kidney, that is not your kidney anymore.
• 39:39
  [SPEAKER_00]: I have no control over
• 39:43
  [SPEAKER_00]: sitting right next to me, sitting right next to me, which is completely wild.
• 39:50
  [SPEAKER_00]: But I don't have control over what happens to my kidney after it leaves my body.
• 39:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: The gift is in the donation, and that's where you have to relinquish any control.
• 40:00
  [SPEAKER_00]: And as for a mildly type a person, that is difficult, but I want Cliff.
• 40:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: on a cliff to live his life and with with my kidney and his kidney now actually it's not my kidney anymore it's his kidney the best way he can possibly live it doesn't help to because you knew by giving it you knew who you were giving it to it's going to cliff it was going to be taken care of it wasn't somebody that was just gonna not absolutely that is a hundred percent a big part of when you're a living donor when you're
• 40:39
  [SPEAKER_00]: When you're giving up one of your kidneys, you absolutely want to make sure it's taken care of.
• 40:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: You don't want someone to kind of squander that away, right?
• 40:48
  [SPEAKER_00]: I knew hands down a hundred percent that he was going to do whatever it takes to make this transplant and this kidney successful.
• 40:59
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so that completely uses your mind.
• 41:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: when you're thinking about doing something like this.
• 41:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: But ultimately, at the end of the day, your choice to donate isn't tied to how the person lives our life or it shouldn't be because you can be let down in so many different ways.
• 41:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: If you have this grandiose idea that you're saving a person's life and then what if they don't measure up to
• 41:32
  [SPEAKER_00]: what you think they should be.
• 41:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: You have to disassociate at the at the donation.
• 41:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: Once that kidney leaves your body, you have to be okay with whatever happens next.
• 41:50
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so when it can be really scary because, you know, certainly I had fears, what is it sales?
• 41:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like one of my big questions going like, you know, leading up to it is how soon will that kidney start working?
• 42:02
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like I want to know, you know, like I want to know all the details.
• 42:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, and so after transplant, our surgeon was like, it pinked up immediately and it started making urine.
• 42:14
  [SPEAKER_00]: It was like, we're like, so happy about P. Yeah.
• 42:18
  [SPEAKER_03]: What point did you kind of reveal yourself so that Cliff find that?
• 42:22
  [SPEAKER_03]: Because I know Cliff knew he had a donor kidney, but when you found that you had donor kidney, you didn't know it was cure right away.
• 42:29
  [SPEAKER_03]: Did you?
• 42:29
  [SPEAKER_02]: Not right not right away.
• 42:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: They tell you that you had a registration right.
• 42:34
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yes, I knew I had a registration and I knew the process is kind of interesting when she's doing all of her testing I'm doing my second round of testing because it's the second year because you have to be
• 42:51
  [SPEAKER_02]: eligible for this, you know, you can't.
• 42:53
  [SPEAKER_02]: And fortunately for me, I didn't have some extinuating circumstances like maybe diabetes.
• 42:58
  [SPEAKER_02]: It doesn't mean you can't get a kidney.
• 43:01
  [SPEAKER_02]: It just means I was a better risk because our better opportunity that I should have said for a kidney because I didn't have those things.
• 43:12
  [SPEAKER_02]: So we were kind of going through that same time.
• 43:14
  [SPEAKER_02]: But Dennis things unfolded.
• 43:17
  [SPEAKER_02]: There became a possibility.
• 43:19
  [SPEAKER_02]: Our coordinator would call me and say, Cliff, there's a possibility here.
• 43:25
  [SPEAKER_02]: And then you have to put herself in a bubble to stay focused on that.
• 43:33
  [SPEAKER_02]: I knew I had to stay in a different focus of you've got to keep going on with your life and not allow yourself to just think about this all the time.
• 43:43
  [SPEAKER_02]: Because you know, there's a chance
• 43:47
  [SPEAKER_02]: of a lifesaving donation going to occur.
• 43:51
  [SPEAKER_02]: So I asked finally started asking some questions and of course she still couldn't quite tell me yet because you know in the end Kira had to get herself all she was all the way there but she
• 44:06
  [SPEAKER_02]: You talk about, you know, we talk about toughness all the time in life.
• 44:10
  [SPEAKER_02]: And everybody said to me, man, you must really be tough to go into that surgery and get a kidty.
• 44:16
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I think really what kind of choice did I have in the end?
• 44:20
  [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, I can go a long time on dialysis, but this is a chance at a new life.
• 44:26
  [SPEAKER_02]: But think about what she had to do.
• 44:29
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I think she's the most mentally tough person that I've had the opportunity to be around.
• 44:37
  [SPEAKER_02]: Because I remember the first time we met finally and I don't want to jump too far ahead here.
• 44:41
  [SPEAKER_02]: But she had a hold of my hand and she had a hold of my wife's hand.
• 44:47
  [SPEAKER_02]: And she said, thank you for this opportunity.
• 44:51
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I thought, OK, wait a second.
• 44:54
  [SPEAKER_02]: I'm the one.
• 44:56
  [SPEAKER_06]: It really isn't blessing that you're giving.
• 44:58
  [SPEAKER_06]: It really isn't opportunity.
• 45:00
  [SPEAKER_03]: And you know, you will always be an angel to the Hawkins family.
• 45:04
  [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, you're forever, you are going to hold a very special place in the hearts, not just Cliff, but his wife and his kids because of what you're gift.
• 45:16
  [SPEAKER_03]: And it's an unselfish gift.
• 45:18
  [SPEAKER_03]: It truly isn't unselfish gift.
• 45:21
  [SPEAKER_02]: beyond you know and going beyond that you know my sister's even you know in a way they get benefited that you know their brother the only brother they have might might be you know we're not in control of what goes on in our life but it gives them the feeling that we can keep moving forward and so that is kind of where we were and finally
• 45:49
  [SPEAKER_02]: I was hanging up the phone one day with my coordinator, and she said, click, you don't ever know where these people come from.
• 45:56
  [SPEAKER_02]: You might have had this person in a camp or something.
• 45:59
  [SPEAKER_02]: So then I'm thinking, okay, what's that mean?
• 46:03
  [SPEAKER_02]: Okay, you know, because I ran a little bit of a little bit of a camp in my life, and then plus the shooting clinics, you know, ninety or hundred, but anyway, that's kind of where it started, and then
• 46:16
  [SPEAKER_02]: the process of revealing came the next.
• 46:19
  [SPEAKER_03]: Did you reveal it or did somebody else reveal it?
• 46:22
  [SPEAKER_00]: No, I did, you know, my my intention was never to stay anonymous.
• 46:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: And one, I had to let my family know first.
• 46:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: So, you know, it was a series of conversations of, hey, this is what I'm going to do.
• 46:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: And, you know, once I made all those notifications and mind you, my family is wonderful.
• 46:43
  [SPEAKER_00]: They're used to me kind of doing
• 46:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: Maybe not mainstream things.
• 46:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, I was a flight nurse for ten years.
• 46:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: I was a travel nurse and I traveled around a living Hawaii.
• 46:59
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I've done some kind of some extreme things in my life.
• 47:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: So this is kind of on par for my personality here.
• 47:08
  [SPEAKER_00]: So my family was not surprised and they're like, yes, this absolutely fits who you are as a person and we fully support you.
• 47:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: So then it's, gosh, how do I, how do I tell Cliff, it's me?
• 47:22
  [SPEAKER_00]: I don't know what to say, you know, do I, do I call him?
• 47:28
  [SPEAKER_00]: Do I email him?
• 47:30
  [SPEAKER_00]: Do I show up at one of his basketball games and be like, hey, it's me.
• 47:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: I said, I stuck into the gym to watch him cook a son.
• 47:40
  [SPEAKER_02]: I still didn't know.
• 47:43
  [SPEAKER_03]: So what did you start?
• 47:44
  [SPEAKER_03]: Would you be to just sneak into it?
• 47:46
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'm not into the sectional game.
• 47:48
  [SPEAKER_00]: Okay.
• 47:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: I did it.
• 47:50
  [SPEAKER_00]: Grant and I, yeah.
• 47:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: We were sitting up high and I was like, oh my gosh, this is this is who I remember.
• 47:58
  [SPEAKER_00]: And down on the sidelines with his intensity and just I loved it.
• 48:03
  [SPEAKER_00]: I loved it.
• 48:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: I just brought back all sorts of good memories.
• 48:07
  [SPEAKER_00]: But ultimately I ended up writing an email.
• 48:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: And the subject line was, hi coach, because what do you say, like, it is, it's got a bit of a truth.
• 48:21
  [SPEAKER_03]: But I'm sure if you're used, I mean, seeing them at the game, that's not unusual for you because having covered him, so many of his former players and former assistant coaches show up.
• 48:33
  [SPEAKER_03]: to tipped in games and show up.
• 48:35
  [SPEAKER_03]: And they just, I mean, and they stayed to talk to him afterwards.
• 48:37
  [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, they show up in support of him, which is in itself tells more than anything about the person you are cliff, but those people years later still show up to support you and how that shows the impact you've had on their lives.
• 48:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: Well, it's why this is happened.
• 48:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: is because of who he is and his relationship building and the people who respect and admire him so much that he is given so much back to every single community he's lived in that these people continue to show up in his lives.
• 49:14
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, it, you know, I always thought a lot of times people would ask me if I was speaking at a clinic, what's most important?
• 49:25
  [SPEAKER_02]: Your offense, your defense, or the rebounding game, and I would say the relationship part.
• 49:33
  [SPEAKER_02]: Because I felt like, you know, when you coach, you have to be honest, and you have to have
• 49:39
  [SPEAKER_02]: difficult conversations sometime, but if the players know that you truly care about them.
• 49:46
  [SPEAKER_02]: And when you have your parent meeting, you explain that.
• 49:49
  [SPEAKER_02]: There's difficult times because some people are only concerned about, did we win and did my son play?
• 49:58
  [SPEAKER_02]: But there's, as much as there's talked about that, not everybody's like that.
• 50:03
  [SPEAKER_02]: There's so many good people and so many good parents and so many good players.
• 50:08
  [SPEAKER_02]: And especially players,
• 50:10
  [SPEAKER_02]: that you build that relationship with so they understand.
• 50:14
  [SPEAKER_02]: This isn't anything personal.
• 50:16
  [SPEAKER_02]: This is maybe where we have to do.
• 50:17
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I know there's been times where I said, we're going to change roles here.
• 50:20
  [SPEAKER_02]: I'm going to be the player and you're going to be the coach.
• 50:24
  [SPEAKER_02]: And we're going to suggest, you know, we're going to go through this.
• 50:27
  [SPEAKER_02]: And sometimes that was helpful to the player because it's hard for them, you know, but one of the greatest ever situations was at DeCalp High School with Nate Tatman, who was a senior on the very first team, a junior on the very first team I had.
• 50:44
  [SPEAKER_02]: And when he became a senior, Luke Recker, Mr. Basketball, was a freshman.
• 50:50
  [SPEAKER_02]: And believe it or not, Luke didn't start the first six games.
• 50:55
  [SPEAKER_02]: But on that sixth game, I knew the seventh game, Luke was going to have to start.
• 51:00
  [SPEAKER_02]: It was time.
• 51:01
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so I brought Nate into the office and I sat down and said, Nate, I'm here to talk to you today.
• 51:07
  [SPEAKER_02]: And he goes, coach, you don't have to go any further.
• 51:10
  [SPEAKER_02]: He said,
• 51:11
  [SPEAKER_02]: looks better in me, and I know the way you like to press, you can bring me off the bench for some interview.
• 51:18
  [SPEAKER_02]: This is a greatest individual meeting I've ever had, Nate took care of it, okay?
• 51:23
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so, over the years, I think when you're straight ahead, honest, caring, you know, sometimes there's things to come back, but you're always trying to pay forward.
• 51:38
  [SPEAKER_02]: And this is a story that is unbelievable.
• 51:43
  [SPEAKER_02]: You know, I remember Kira, I remember her in camp.
• 51:47
  [SPEAKER_02]: I've never thought one time about a trans plant.
• 51:50
  [SPEAKER_02]: You know, you just don't think about these things.
• 51:52
  [SPEAKER_02]: You don't know you're going to maybe be ill.
• 51:55
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so, so I am so thankful.
• 52:00
  [SPEAKER_02]: She didn't, she didn't did watch the sectional and then it came time.
• 52:05
  [SPEAKER_02]: I got her.
• 52:07
  [SPEAKER_02]: I was leaving Nolan Swan's Anderson college game in the playoffs and it happened to be on the night.
• 52:14
  [SPEAKER_02]: I could see it and we were off in the sectional at that point and so I called my, it was a Friday night actually so it was, I guess,
• 52:27
  [SPEAKER_02]: somewhere in there, maybe just before the sectional bit.
• 52:31
  [SPEAKER_02]: So it was a Friday night and I had to go back to Tipton from where I scouted because that's where my machines set up.
• 52:41
  [SPEAKER_02]: And that was the way this year was, you know, last year and a half was, I basically was in Tipton Monday through Saturday and then Sunday I go home.
• 52:49
  [SPEAKER_02]: just for a little while and then drive back at night because of seven days a week eight hours a day.
• 52:54
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so it wasn't work carrying the machine around all the time.
• 52:58
  [SPEAKER_02]: I did a few times, holidays, things like that.
• 53:00
  [SPEAKER_02]: But I didn't want to have a machine break or something like that.
• 53:06
  [SPEAKER_02]: But anyway, Julie said, I have an email and I know the donor.
• 53:13
  [SPEAKER_02]: And she said, would you like to know?
• 53:16
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I'm driving down this country road out of Anderson.
• 53:18
  [SPEAKER_02]: heading back up to a tipten.
• 53:21
  [SPEAKER_02]: And, you know, what I remember there was a few times in my basketball career where I had to play the second game of a day where you won the first game and then you were going to play again.
• 53:30
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I remember sometimes how my body felt just different because you were tired, okay?
• 53:42
  [SPEAKER_02]: And you felt different nerve endings.
• 53:45
  [SPEAKER_02]: And as I was driving,
• 53:47
  [SPEAKER_02]: all these nerve endings that I felt in the second game of a day or the emotion of
• 53:56
  [SPEAKER_02]: there really is a kidney because you know you always believe it can happen but it does feel different times when you're by yourself that it could be make believe and I said I can't I can't have you tell me right now because and I start kind of shaking right now because I said I just need to get back to the apartment tip and I'll call you and so then I called her and I said you know I just would like to wait till I come home tomorrow morning
• 54:26
  [SPEAKER_02]: So I definitely started my dialysis really early that night.
• 54:30
  [SPEAKER_02]: So you were anxious to go, yeah, I was ready to roll four or five o'clock, okay.
• 54:36
  [SPEAKER_02]: So in Julie knew I would, but so we got there and she had the email and she said, do you want to see it?
• 54:43
  [SPEAKER_02]: I said that.
• 54:44
  [SPEAKER_02]: Just lay it on the coffee table.
• 54:45
  [SPEAKER_02]: So I was on one side, she was on the other and the email was right between us.
• 54:51
  [SPEAKER_02]: And we just talked.
• 54:56
  [SPEAKER_02]: I said, you know, this is something that it was emotional.
• 54:59
  [SPEAKER_02]: You know, I'm an older guy, but at the moment that you know your life has a possibility to change, and that all the things that you were questioning, could you keep doing this?
• 55:13
  [SPEAKER_02]: Could you keep going?
• 55:14
  [SPEAKER_02]: Could you go places?
• 55:15
  [SPEAKER_02]: Could you, could you, could you function?
• 55:20
  [SPEAKER_02]: All of that was going through me.
• 55:22
  [SPEAKER_02]: And of course, who was the person?
• 55:25
  [SPEAKER_02]: and family Julie said because you know you think when maybe a camp person I'm thinking about all the different people that I've been involved with you know but at that moment I wasn't thinking about the girl's basketball camp I ever
• 55:47
  [SPEAKER_02]: but I she said I think you'll feel better when you see the signature and where this person works
• 55:58
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so first I read the email, I wanted to stay disciplined enough to read what the message was.
• 56:04
  [SPEAKER_03]: Do you want to get to the end?
• 56:05
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, it's so touching.
• 56:06
  [SPEAKER_02]: I think I may use it for a letter of recommendation for something.
• 56:10
  [SPEAKER_02]: But then I read and immediately I knew the name and I had to think a little bit about how long it had been.
• 56:23
  [SPEAKER_02]: Again, I wasn't watching her at her job.
• 56:25
  [SPEAKER_02]: She had been watching me at my job.
• 56:28
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so immediately I grabbed every yearbook I had.
• 56:32
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I called Megan, and Megan had all the yearbooks out in Georgia that she had.
• 56:38
  [SPEAKER_02]: And Matt said, oh, dad, yeah.
• 56:41
  [SPEAKER_02]: Here are absolutely, you know, because he had gone to the girl in her class at that time.
• 56:46
  [SPEAKER_02]: And they she'd been over to house.
• 56:48
  [SPEAKER_02]: And Matt was just so touched.
• 56:51
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so then it was real and now we were going to take the next step about how we were going to meet and go for it.
• 57:01
  [SPEAKER_03]: Did Julie say I want to imagine when she opened up that email and she started to read it.
• 57:06
  [SPEAKER_03]: I can only imagine how emotional she got reading it.
• 57:14
  [SPEAKER_03]: And the relief, I mean, just for her, because I am sure that your family wanted to be strong for you and you were going through this.
• 57:22
  [SPEAKER_03]: And didn't really want you to see their worry or their concern that you might not find a kidney in time.
• 57:28
  [SPEAKER_03]: So her relief had to be just tremendous too.
• 57:32
  [SPEAKER_02]: Oh, I think so.
• 57:33
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I think the difference in her and sheera.
• 57:39
  [SPEAKER_02]: They really understand what's going on here.
• 57:42
  [SPEAKER_02]: You know, I always tell people, you know, what Kira's done in her life, being a travel nurse, and being on a helicopter, bringing people to save their lives, working in the NICU.
• 57:57
  [SPEAKER_02]: She has seen it all.
• 57:59
  [SPEAKER_02]: My daughter worked in the NICU before she got into research and teaching mat.
• 58:04
  [SPEAKER_02]: is a doctor at Emory in Georgia and Julie was a surgical nurse for thirty years and I was a physed major and a social studies teacher.
• 58:16
  [SPEAKER_02]: So what did I know?
• 58:17
  [SPEAKER_02]: You know, all I knew though because of how I always have viewed life there was an opportunity for a chance.
• 58:28
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so when people tell me, Cliff, you had to be so brave to do this.
• 58:34
  [SPEAKER_02]: You know, it was different.
• 58:35
  [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, it was different when they wheeled me into the surgical room and I saw people standing over, you know, the doctor says, well, there's where the kid needs it.
• 58:44
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I think it just came out of here.
• 58:47
  [SPEAKER_02]: And there's somebody guarding it, you know.
• 58:51
  [SPEAKER_02]: But I go back to what Kira has done because as you put it on the other end, I'm not sure, you know, and that's why I told her today she helped my hand and my wife out.
• 59:03
  [SPEAKER_02]: I feel so guilty because I don't want to feel guilty.
• 59:07
  [SPEAKER_02]: I feel so rewarded too, but the way I feel guilty is I only thought about it when I went to the driver's license branch.
• 59:15
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I never was signed up as a kidney donor.
• 59:20
  [SPEAKER_02]: And to think someone is do that everybody.
• 59:24
  [SPEAKER_03]: I have been a, I have got donor.
• 59:26
  [SPEAKER_03]: I, then in fact, you know, because we were talking about family.
• 59:29
  [SPEAKER_03]: And I remember when I told my mom and my sisters, because if something happens to you in your license isn't, you know, maybe mangled or turned up, I said, look, I want you to know, I want to be a donor.
• 59:40
  [SPEAKER_03]: I have signed donor.
• 59:41
  [SPEAKER_03]: My mom goes.
• 59:42
  [SPEAKER_03]: But, and I said, I want to be a donor.
• 59:45
  [SPEAKER_03]: If I have any organs that are,
• 59:48
  [SPEAKER_03]: able to be a donor, I want to donate, whether it's to save somebody's life, or eyesight, or whatever.
• 59:55
  [SPEAKER_03]: I said, I want to donate, I want to be a donor.
• 59:58
  [SPEAKER_06]: Speaking of which, you specifically donated the clip, but people don't have to specifically donate to anybody, right?
• 1:00:56
  [SPEAKER_04]: You know, I had a classmate.
• 1:00:58
  [SPEAKER_03]: I think we were in her thirties and she developed uh, leukemia and they for family had uh, encouraged everybody our class son up things and you wouldn't believe the line for people to be bone marrow but to go to donate blood and to sign up to be bone marrow bone first.
• 1:01:15
  [SPEAKER_03]: I remember and I remember the bone marrow.
• 1:01:16
  [SPEAKER_03]: Kurt, people calling me said, hey, we got this that you said you were in red and I said, yeah, they said, are you, you're not, if you're not a match or are you willing to donate to anybody if it hand comes up.
• 1:01:28
  [SPEAKER_03]: And I said, well,
• 1:01:30
  [SPEAKER_03]: I said, yes, I said, you know, some of it would be logistics and finance, because if it wouldn't be somebody far away, I might not be able to afford to go do it.
• 1:01:39
  [SPEAKER_03]: But I said, yes, I said, I just didn't do this for my classroom.
• 1:01:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: I would love to be able to help her, but there's a need, and so yes.
• 1:01:48
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, there's absolutely a need for bone marrow transplant, which actually I did at the beginning of my career.
• 1:01:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: So transplant has been in my blood.
• 1:01:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so, yeah, you can...
• 1:02:02
  [SPEAKER_00]: Whether it's donating blood, donating your bone marrow, donating a kidney, these are acts of altruism that you can do to save someone else's life.
• 1:02:13
  [SPEAKER_00]: And as, you know, cue and beings that are sitting around the table, what is more the purpose of life than to be able to take care of each other?
• 1:02:27
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, at the end of the day, nobody's gonna care about my title.
• 1:02:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, what car I'm driving?
• 1:02:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: That doesn't mean anything to me other than my greatest achievements in life is being a mom.
• 1:02:45
  [SPEAKER_00]: And now, you know, being a living kidney donor and affecting someone else's life in the way that I have.
• 1:02:53
  [SPEAKER_00]: And that, to me, is the true meaning and purpose of life.
• 1:02:57
  [SPEAKER_03]: So you guys now sit down and you met before your surgery, right?
• 1:03:04
  [SPEAKER_03]: We had lunch.
• 1:03:04
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
• 1:03:05
  [SPEAKER_02]: We had lunch.
• 1:03:05
  [SPEAKER_02]: We ordered the same thing that day as well.
• 1:03:08
  [SPEAKER_00]: I know it's been.
• 1:03:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: I know it's been.
• 1:03:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: We are compatible in our food choices and in our blood type.
• 1:03:15
  [SPEAKER_03]: Probably a little bit of tissue too, right?
• 1:03:17
  [SPEAKER_03]: Because we have to match up tissue.
• 1:03:19
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yes.
• 1:03:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yes.
• 1:03:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yes.
• 1:03:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 1:03:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: There's a couple levels.
• 1:03:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: You have to be the correct blood type for each other and then the tissue typing just to make sure is there.
• 1:03:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: is what is the probability of rejecting because of antibiotic antibodies and such and some.
• 1:03:37
  [SPEAKER_06]: Somebody wants to do more of what would be the first step that you would recommend.
• 1:03:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: There's two ways to becoming an organ donor.
• 1:03:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: One is through the registry, through B&V or donate life in Vienna of saying yes to when I die, I want to become an organ donor.
• 1:03:58
  [SPEAKER_00]: then there's also living donation which can be done through the National Kidney Registry and going to their website and finding out more of how to become a living donor.
• 1:04:12
  [SPEAKER_00]: But I do want to mention it starts with someone saying yes.
• 1:04:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: starts with someone signing up to be an organ donor.
• 1:04:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: And just to kind of talk through some of the myths that I hear in my profession, well, if I have that heart on my license, if something happens to me, they're not going to save me.
• 1:04:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: that is completely inaccurate, but you, you would think that people, like, that is a real fear of people going into the hospital thinking that they won't save you and just take your organs.
• 1:04:45
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, because the way they're not going to save you is if you have a DNR.
• 1:04:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: So one as a medical professional who has worked in an EMS and emergency rooms on a helicopter, not once did I ever pay attention to someone's donor status.
• 1:05:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: As a healthcare professional, our first
• 1:05:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: Priority is what do I have to do to save your life?
• 1:05:13
  [SPEAKER_06]: That's the only priority for us.
• 1:05:14
  [SPEAKER_00]: The only priority is how can I save your life?
• 1:05:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: And here's the thing to become an organ donor.
• 1:05:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: Someone has to actually save your life.
• 1:05:25
  [SPEAKER_00]: They have to do all the things to save your life for you to become an organ donor because we can't actually recover organs for transplantation without life support.
• 1:05:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: So you have to be stable in the hospital.
• 1:05:43
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yes.
• 1:05:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: And then that's when you, you know, unfortunately, if you become brain dead through a traumatic head injury or your family makes a withdraw decision saying this isn't the quality of life.
• 1:05:58
  [SPEAKER_00]: My level and would want and they move into end of life decision making comfort care and then we can proceed.
• 1:06:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: But just because someone does choose is not to register in the state of Indiana, that doesn't mean they are not supportive of donation.
• 1:06:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: It means that they're leaving the decision up to their family.
• 1:06:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: So if anybody gets anything out of this podcast is really talk about what your wishes are at your end of life because your family is left trying to make these decisions for you.
• 1:06:32
  [SPEAKER_00]: And like I love what you said,
• 1:06:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: Whatever happens, I want to be an organ donor and I want you to know that to your mom, to your family, is because people don't know what your wishes are.
• 1:06:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: Just as much as like, do you want to be cremated or buried or whatever, but a lot of it is.
• 1:06:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, if I had the opportunity to become an organ donor, this is what I want or not.
• 1:06:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, that these are, it's a very personal decision.
• 1:06:58
  [SPEAKER_00]: Obviously, I advocate for people becoming an organ donor because what are you going to do with your organs afterwards?
• 1:07:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: If you have the ability to save someone's life, my thinking is why wouldn't you?
• 1:07:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: There's lots of
• 1:07:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, we can get into all the religious and all that reasons why someone may not want to donate.
• 1:07:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: And that is perfectly fine and respected.
• 1:07:22
  [SPEAKER_00]: But you just have to let people know what your wishes are.
• 1:07:25
  [SPEAKER_00]: So yes, in the state of Indiana, you can make that decision for yourself.
• 1:07:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: which is at the time of my death if I'm eligible.
• 1:07:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: I want to become an organ donor or if I choose not to, that means I'm leaving the decision up to my family.
• 1:07:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: That does not mean it's a no.
• 1:07:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: It just means I'm allowing my family to make that decision.
• 1:07:47
  [SPEAKER_06]: Coach, I bet you look at life a little differently now and tell us what it's been like since.
• 1:07:57
  [SPEAKER_02]: I've always enjoyed life and there's been some challenges and I've always thought you have to focus on what needs to be done now.
• 1:08:08
  [SPEAKER_02]: But I do look at life differently and I knew deep down
• 1:08:14
  [SPEAKER_02]: when Kira and I met again that life would be different.
• 1:08:20
  [SPEAKER_02]: And when I met our doctor that did the surgeries for both of us in the same day,
• 1:08:28
  [SPEAKER_02]: We arrived on our game day at five thirty in the morning, and I came out of the surgery at ten after seven at night.
• 1:08:35
  [SPEAKER_02]: So it was a long day, but when I met him, as he came in, Kira was done, and he told me good things, and of course, you know, that's a relief.
• 1:08:46
  [SPEAKER_02]: And Grant came by and told us to, he had been down to find out.
• 1:08:52
  [SPEAKER_02]: But Dr. Gonyne said, we're going to do whatever it takes.
• 1:08:58
  [SPEAKER_02]: for as long as it takes.
• 1:09:00
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I've always lived by that coaching.
• 1:09:03
  [SPEAKER_02]: You know, I'm going to do this until we get it right.
• 1:09:07
  [SPEAKER_02]: That gave me a tremendous amount of confidence in what he said.
• 1:09:13
  [SPEAKER_02]: And then when we were actually in the surgical room, which was amazing how big it was and how many people were in there, lots of people.
• 1:09:22
  [SPEAKER_02]: All masked, all capping gown.
• 1:09:24
  [SPEAKER_02]: And he said, you have any last words you'd like to say.
• 1:09:30
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I said, let's win.
• 1:09:33
  [SPEAKER_02]: And then I was, I know that was it.
• 1:09:35
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I didn't wake up until probably ten after nine that night.
• 1:09:39
  [SPEAKER_02]: But I just would like to say that you do look at life differently.
• 1:09:46
  [SPEAKER_02]: But you still had a lot of this
• 1:09:50
  [SPEAKER_02]: Kara looks at it differently now too, but she was already looking at life in a different way than many people do.
• 1:09:58
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I think to be able to stay and teaching and coaching as many years as I did, I had to look at things differently and understand.
• 1:10:08
  [SPEAKER_02]: There's some bumps, there's some adversity, but you keep going.
• 1:10:12
  [SPEAKER_02]: And then to have this happen, you know, it's like you realize
• 1:10:20
  [SPEAKER_02]: I have another opportunity here.
• 1:10:23
  [SPEAKER_02]: My life could have been shortened, you know, much sooner.
• 1:10:27
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so, what am I going to do with that?
• 1:10:29
  [SPEAKER_02]: So, even more laser-focused than ever.
• 1:10:33
  [SPEAKER_02]: And some things are starting to come together now as I process.
• 1:10:37
  [SPEAKER_02]: Because the most important thing was, number one, get well.
• 1:10:40
  [SPEAKER_02]: But number two was to begin to tell our message.
• 1:10:45
  [SPEAKER_03]: Tell us, part of that getting well, I mean, how long was it from you post-servient?
• 1:10:50
  [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, do you still have limitations?
• 1:10:54
  [SPEAKER_03]: Fourteen weeks out.
• 1:10:56
  [SPEAKER_02]: Not really, but I do need to watch lifting some heavy things.
• 1:10:59
  [SPEAKER_02]: You know, if it hurts, I stop.
• 1:11:00
  [SPEAKER_02]: But when you start out, you know, there are a few things you've got to pay attention to, but the biggest thing is,
• 1:11:09
  [SPEAKER_02]: You've really got to take your medications.
• 1:11:12
  [SPEAKER_02]: You can't miss.
• 1:11:13
  [SPEAKER_02]: You have to prepare that.
• 1:11:15
  [SPEAKER_02]: You have to sit and think about it and make sure.
• 1:11:18
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I made sure that Julie watched me do my medications.
• 1:11:23
  [SPEAKER_02]: I'd always done all of those during dialysis.
• 1:11:25
  [SPEAKER_02]: I had to relearn the whole process of medications because what you do on dialysis is totally different than what you do after transplant.
• 1:11:34
  [SPEAKER_02]: But that's okay because
• 1:11:35
  [SPEAKER_02]: There's three medicines I'll take the rest of my life that are anti-rejection medicines so that my kidney can be helpful.
• 1:11:44
  [SPEAKER_02]: So that's something that you do but there's a lot of rest involved but there's a lot of getting up and making yourself move.
• 1:11:55
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so the first day after there's a few days where I took it real easy I could walk
• 1:12:02
  [SPEAKER_02]: down the road three houses and I could walk back three houses.
• 1:12:07
  [SPEAKER_02]: So that was six.
• 1:12:09
  [SPEAKER_02]: The next day I walked to the fourth house.
• 1:12:12
  [SPEAKER_02]: Eight.
• 1:12:14
  [SPEAKER_02]: Next day, ten.
• 1:12:15
  [SPEAKER_02]: And eventually I got up to seventy and I thought, okay, that's enough.
• 1:12:21
  [SPEAKER_02]: I'm going, because I was getting losing track at that.
• 1:12:24
  [SPEAKER_02]: Is that twenty four or twenty six?
• 1:12:25
  [SPEAKER_02]: Okay.
• 1:12:26
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so then I got into thirty minute walks every day.
• 1:12:30
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I've continued, I haven't moved beyond that other than I really pick up my pace now.
• 1:12:38
  [SPEAKER_02]: Because I want to get, I don't want to stop.
• 1:12:41
  [SPEAKER_02]: I want to keep stronger at the whole.
• 1:12:43
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
• 1:12:44
  [SPEAKER_02]: And then I noticed how weak I had been, even through dialysis, my upper body strength, you know, standing at this counter in the kitchen, and maybe trying to fix a sandwich.
• 1:12:56
  [SPEAKER_02]: My shoulders were getting exhausted, or if I had to lift,
• 1:12:59
  [SPEAKER_02]: something from the cabinet but all I did every day was I started each morning with what I called a gratitude and celebration law which that was after I finally got through so many houses so it only be like eight to ten minutes
• 1:13:16
  [SPEAKER_02]: I walked outside in the dark, walked back, and all this I would think about is what it happened to me.
• 1:13:24
  [SPEAKER_02]: And what Kira had done, and how thankful that I had this opportunity to be walking in the dark right now, listening to the birds' church, I love that.
• 1:13:34
  [SPEAKER_02]: It was meaningful to me.
• 1:13:38
  [SPEAKER_02]: And then I would go on my exercise later in the day.
• 1:13:43
  [SPEAKER_02]: I had to gratitude is beyond belief.
• 1:13:48
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I don't know how much longer we're going to go here.
• 1:13:51
  [SPEAKER_02]: I've got a statement here that I'll go ahead and make now for anyone that is listening.
• 1:13:59
  [SPEAKER_02]: I trust, I hope that they can believe.
• 1:14:04
  [SPEAKER_02]: This can happen.
• 1:14:06
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I know that sometimes
• 1:14:09
  [SPEAKER_02]: it can be discouraged you look how fortunate I was there's only seven thousand living donors a year in the United States of America and I was one of them but I still advocated and I was advocating at different places I had been there was other websites that coaches had had sent some things out and people were looking at the website and I
• 1:14:35
  [SPEAKER_02]: encourage them to tell the story because it's easy to turn inward and the only reason I turned a little bit inward, Ectipton, was I was also working with fifteen, sixteen and seventeen year old young people and I didn't want them focused on that.
• 1:14:51
  [SPEAKER_02]: So I had that part of the story but then I had to do this other part to allow some adult young men that I've coached, no, and
• 1:15:03
  [SPEAKER_02]: You have anybody you can talk to and be your advocate.
• 1:15:07
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I struggle for a while, what will I say?
• 1:15:09
  [SPEAKER_02]: And eventually I just said, what would I say?
• 1:15:12
  [SPEAKER_02]: I would just say, I'm not here to ask you for your kidney.
• 1:15:15
  [SPEAKER_02]: But I am here to ask you to tell my story.
• 1:15:18
  [SPEAKER_02]: So people, even when they're discouraged, I hope that they can hear from this podcast that they'll make a renewed effort a few minutes every day.
• 1:15:31
  [SPEAKER_02]: to try to be their advocate for themselves.
• 1:15:35
  [SPEAKER_02]: And to believe there's somebody out there, because you know, our world right now, there's lots of things that affect a lot of people.
• 1:15:43
  [SPEAKER_02]: There's lots of media that come to people in very bad feelings and situations.
• 1:15:50
  [SPEAKER_02]: But what I see is mankind has a lot of goodness.
• 1:15:59
  [SPEAKER_02]: What Kara has done is beyond belief.
• 1:16:02
  [SPEAKER_02]: But when you think about what you've done for our tips and community, you've had the fight to keep some type in this paper.
• 1:16:12
  [SPEAKER_02]: Because you know they were, they were going to drop.
• 1:16:15
  [SPEAKER_02]: But you found a way, it may not be the way you want, but it's the way you've done it.
• 1:16:19
  [SPEAKER_02]: You've added podcasts to things so that you can stay in what you both love.
• 1:16:25
  [SPEAKER_02]: You both love it.
• 1:16:27
  [SPEAKER_02]: you're finding your way and that's why we can't ever forget.
• 1:16:33
  [SPEAKER_02]: People will hear the message at some point and it only still takes one.
• 1:16:42
  [SPEAKER_02]: And that's why I hope people will continue to believe no matter what and share their story.
• 1:16:46
  [SPEAKER_06]: And it really is a blessing to him, of course.
• 1:16:49
  [SPEAKER_06]: But it's a blessing to you as well, to be able to give life and tell us about your recovery and what your life's been like since.
• 1:16:58
  [SPEAKER_00]: Oh gosh, you know,
• 1:17:01
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's hard to kind of process.
• 1:17:03
  [SPEAKER_00]: I've always said it's hard to process like the impact that you just did in this decision and what this means.
• 1:17:08
  [SPEAKER_00]: But ultimately, you guys have listened to Cliff talk and he's just one of the most kind, genuine human beings you'll ever meet.
• 1:17:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: And of course, you want to do something to help him out.
• 1:17:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: And that's absolutely cool.
• 1:17:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: He has added so much joy and
• 1:17:27
  [SPEAKER_00]: to my life, like I said, like I gained a family.
• 1:17:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: I gave up a candy and gained an entire family.
• 1:17:35
  [SPEAKER_00]: They have embraced me.
• 1:17:36
  [SPEAKER_00]: They have invited me into their lives.
• 1:17:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: And you know, Cliff and I talk almost every day just to check in.
• 1:17:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: I am so fulfilled by this experience in ways that you just can't even fathom.
• 1:17:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: You don't think about it.
• 1:17:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: I didn't do this to get anything in return.
• 1:17:59
  [SPEAKER_00]: But what I gained was so much more than I could have ever thought about.
• 1:18:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'm out of it.
• 1:18:08
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'm proud of our journey.
• 1:18:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: My recovery has been near probably textbook.
• 1:18:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: I had no complications.
• 1:18:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: I was off work only for three weeks.
• 1:18:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: Um, I could have taken six, but, um, you know, I, I like to say I fly a dust now.
• 1:18:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so there's not much heavy lifting that I have to do.
• 1:18:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: My son likes to say all I do is use my mouth and mouse.
• 1:18:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: Um, so.
• 1:18:43
  [SPEAKER_00]: So thank you for that to reduce me to that.
• 1:18:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: But no, I was able to go back to work.
• 1:18:50
  [SPEAKER_00]: I went back remotely on the fourth week after surgery.
• 1:18:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: I felt great.
• 1:18:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: I literally don't feel any different.
• 1:19:00
  [SPEAKER_00]: from having to keep these down to one.
• 1:19:03
  [SPEAKER_00]: My energy levels are the same.
• 1:19:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: I feel good.
• 1:19:07
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, other like I had major abdominal surgery.
• 1:19:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like that's not to be lost over.
• 1:19:13
  [SPEAKER_00]: So there were, you know, probably the first week post.
• 1:19:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: Surgery are you just kind of sore and moving slowly, absolutely.
• 1:19:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: It was such a small amount of time to be kind of laid up in the grand spectrum of the year of your life to do something incredible.
• 1:19:35
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so I, you know, I had a smooth recovery.
• 1:19:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'm back to doing everything that I'm golfing.
• 1:19:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: I am, you know, playing, I'm beating all of the ten-year-olds in the neighborhood and basketball, including my son that is important for me to maintain that status.
• 1:19:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so I will let them know that I beat you as a forty-three-year-old who only has one kidney now, I am still schooling you.
• 1:20:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: I know they're gonna, I will stop playing them when I think that that is in jeopardy.
• 1:20:14
  [SPEAKER_02]: You know, what's your question?
• 1:20:17
  [SPEAKER_02]: During dialysis, I did carry a special card in my wallet of information how they could get a whole certain people and so on and what was pertinent to my health at the time.
• 1:20:30
  [SPEAKER_02]: But with transplant,
• 1:20:35
  [SPEAKER_02]: We are becoming more healthy as we go, and Kira is amazing, and I've moved a long way down the road in fourteen weeks.
• 1:20:46
  [SPEAKER_02]: And what I would say to people, obviously, if you have
• 1:20:51
  [SPEAKER_02]: your body opened up, robotic surgery done.
• 1:20:56
  [SPEAKER_02]: There's going to be some slow times starting, but it's no different than anything else.
• 1:21:02
  [SPEAKER_02]: And believe it or not, they have the process for anyone who's thinking about hoping to be a recipient.
• 1:21:11
  [SPEAKER_02]: The most I've ever taken is Tylenol.
• 1:21:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 1:21:15
  [SPEAKER_02]: Same for her.
• 1:21:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: Same for me.
• 1:21:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: I just took Tylenol after surgery, which is incredible.
• 1:21:22
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, they just did such a great job with pain management.
• 1:21:25
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so needs and backs took a lot more.
• 1:21:30
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 1:21:30
  [SPEAKER_00]: But my ACL was a lot worse than a kidney donation.
• 1:21:35
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
• 1:21:36
  [SPEAKER_02]: It's amazing how it works in the incision, what the size is.
• 1:21:42
  [SPEAKER_02]: It's just incredible what these people do.
• 1:21:46
  [SPEAKER_02]: And again, speaking to that, it's incredible what Kira's passion is for what she does for her living.
• 1:21:57
  [SPEAKER_02]: And the message that she sends, you know, people at her workplace don't have to be a kid in the corner, okay?
• 1:22:05
  [SPEAKER_02]: But to be able to be a kid, you don't.
• 1:22:08
  [SPEAKER_02]: And we're going to be speaking to her group and late July here.
• 1:22:15
  [SPEAKER_02]: You know, they're going to see us up front together.
• 1:22:18
  [SPEAKER_02]: We're really the two people that are involved here.
• 1:22:21
  [SPEAKER_02]: She is the donor and me as the recipient.
• 1:22:24
  [SPEAKER_02]: And it can become overwhelming.
• 1:22:29
  [SPEAKER_02]: You know, there are nights sometimes where it's quiet in my house and I will
• 1:22:38
  [SPEAKER_02]: We've done some web different things that we've done videos and so on and the one I always pull up is the very first one by the Indiana donor network because
• 1:22:51
  [SPEAKER_02]: That's where it was in front of the surgery and it was it the day of the surgery and after.
• 1:22:58
  [SPEAKER_02]: And you know on April first we were one week away from the surgery we both were doing our pre-game check if you were okay because I had to make sure you're still good a week before you know and we passed with flying colors and I got to meet her mom and the first thing she says
• 1:23:19
  [SPEAKER_02]: I'm so thankful Kira is doing this.
• 1:23:22
  [SPEAKER_02]: I'm so proud of you.
• 1:23:23
  [SPEAKER_02]: You know, I think about that.
• 1:23:25
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I'm so proud of you as she's doing this for, and then when I told my son, you know, he said, oh, yeah, she was such a nice person when I met her and Kira's mother.
• 1:23:36
  [SPEAKER_02]: And so, you know, I just encourage people to go the distance, never give in and keep living
• 1:23:51
  [SPEAKER_02]: don't stop even though it's difficult just allow yourself more time and be fair to yourself and keep going because if you keep going you're going to keep talking to more people and when you talk to more people the shared the story will get shared that much more so from my side of this
• 1:24:11
  [SPEAKER_02]: We really, I really appreciate both of you doing this for us today at Cafe Padashu and it's really great to see both of you.
• 1:24:25
  [SPEAKER_03]: any final information that you want to make sure that people understand.
• 1:24:30
  [SPEAKER_00]: There are over a hundred thousand people on the wait list today in the United States that waiting on a life saving organ transplant.
• 1:24:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: There are fourteen hundred people here in the state of Indiana who are waiting on a life saving organ transplant.
• 1:24:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: Ninety percent of people on the wait list are waiting for a kidney.
• 1:24:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: a kidney is the easiest thing to donate.
• 1:24:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so we can affect so many people's lives by saying yes to donation, whether that be at the B&B or through living kidney donation and I would encourage people to
• 1:25:13
  [SPEAKER_00]: do their research, understand what it is, and say yes.
• 1:25:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: And if anybody wants to reach out, I'm happy to always have a conversation about donation and transplantation.
• 1:25:25
  [SPEAKER_00]: Obviously, we can talk a long time about it, but I am always willing to have that conversation.
• 1:25:30
  [SPEAKER_03]: One quick question, because it just popped into my mind, are there any age requirements?
• 1:25:35
  [SPEAKER_03]: Do you, can you become too old to,
• 1:25:38
  [SPEAKER_03]: to donate.
• 1:25:39
  [SPEAKER_00]: We actually just transplanted a ninety four year or a ninety five year old person their liver at their end of their life.
• 1:25:48
  [SPEAKER_00]: So no, there are no age relimates.
• 1:25:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: There are certain things that we look at, but we do that every single day to make sure it's the best possible organ for the recipient, but don't rule yourself out.
• 1:26:00
  [SPEAKER_06]: Roach, Carrot, Michelle, thank you so much.
• 1:26:03
  [SPEAKER_06]: It's been a month.
• 1:26:04
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yes, thank you so much.
• 1:26:06
  [SPEAKER_03]: At some point we'll find out a place that you can get in touch with Cliff and even care if you would like for them to come and speak to a group that you have.
• 1:26:18
  [SPEAKER_03]: And let me tell you, they're wonderful through this podcast.
• 1:26:21
  [SPEAKER_03]: I hope you guys listen.
• 1:26:22
  [SPEAKER_03]: I know it's a long one, but their message is, it's an important one.
• 1:26:28
  [SPEAKER_03]: and it's a very important story.
• 1:26:29
  [SPEAKER_03]: Cliff, thank you for allowing me to, when you announce your resignation to kind of tell your story.
• 1:26:35
  [SPEAKER_03]: I'll tell you, it's the most interactive, it's my, by Twitter feed, it's the highest post interaction I had over twenty thousand people check out that post.
• 1:26:46
  [SPEAKER_02]: Well, and thank you for covering Tipton Blue Devils as you did for six years that I was there and thanks to all the Tipton people.
• 1:26:55
  [SPEAKER_02]: It was a wonderful place to coach and it will always reside within my heart as one of the most best places I've ever been.
• 1:27:09
  [SPEAKER_06]: I hope you enjoyed listening to this podcast as much as Michelle and I enjoyed doing it.
• 1:27:15
  [SPEAKER_06]: Thank you so much to coach Hawkins and especially the Tira.
• 1:27:20
  [SPEAKER_06]: For joining the Central Indiana Sports Report and for the celebration of life.
• 1:27:26
  [SPEAKER_06]: They allowed us to be a partner.
• 1:27:30
  [SPEAKER_06]: And thank you so much for listening.
• 1:27:32
  [SPEAKER_06]: Please share this podcast with your friends and family.
• 1:27:36
  [SPEAKER_06]: And please go like subscribe and follow us.
• 1:27:40
  [SPEAKER_06]: Soundcloud Spotify, Apple, Amazon or YouTube.
• 1:27:45
  [SPEAKER_06]: That would be very helpful to us and we would really appreciate it.
• 1:27:51
  [SPEAKER_06]: Central Indiana Sports Report is a product of IGG Media and I love Susie.