California mom hears son’s donated heart beating inside Arizona girl
Feb 2, 2016, 9:58 AM
PHOENIX — Thump. Thump. Thump.
That’s the beautiful sound two mothers from California and Arizona heard inside a little girl at Phoenix Children’s Hospital on Friday.
A tearful Heather Clark heard the heart of her late son, Lukas, beating in the chest of 4-year-old Jordan.
“I was so nervous to meet Jordan,” Clark told People. “But when I finally saw her, it felt like I was meeting an old friend. I ran to her and hugged her.”
After she lost her 7-month-old son in 2013, Clark made the difficult decision to donate his organs.
“I knew I couldn’t do anything with his organs once he passed away, so I thought why not save someone else’s life,” she says. “But when I signed off permission, I knew my baby was 100 percent gone. And that was so hard.”
One of the recipients of his organs was Jordan. She was born with a heart condition called mitral valve regurgitation and would not have survived without a new heart.
“We were so scared,” Jordan’s mother, Esther Gonzalez, told the magazine. “We thought she would never get a heart.”
Though Lukas’ heart was donated anonymously, the mothers eventually found each other via social media on Thanksgiving Day.
Clark said she was “so nervous” to meet Jordan and her mother, but they all bonded instantly. The mothers are now very close friends.
“We tell each other we love each other, because we are in this life together now,” says Gonzalez. “Lukas will always be here in Jordan. It’s beautiful.”
Gonzalez said she is grateful to Clark for deciding to donate Lukas’ organs and plans to tell her daughter about him one day.
“I’m going to tell her that Lukas saved her life. It’s a story about a mothers sacrifice and a little boys sacrifice,” the mom says through tears. “It’s important for her to know about Lukas and to know that he gave up a lot for her to live.”
