8-Year-Old Quadruple Transplant Recipient Meets Parents of 5-Year-Old Donor Who 'Saved Her Life'
— -- Kyree Beachem, an 8-year-old quadruple-organ transplant recipient, recently got to meet the parents of 5-year-old Arianna Morales, who donated her organs to Beachem when she passed away in November.
Kyree's mother Nan Beachem told ABC News today that Arianna's parents Luis and Evelyn Morales visited Kyree this past Wednesday at the Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC, where Kyree has been recovering from surgery and receiving treatments for Hirschprung's Disease, a condition she was born with in which she has missing nerve cells from her colon, making it difficult to digest food.
"It was a very, very emotional meeting," Beachem, 51, said. "No one broke down and sobbed, but there were a lot of quiet tears."
Beachem explained that the Moraleses stayed with Kyree for more than five hours, sharing stories about Arianna, who they discovered had a lot more in common with Kyree than just matching organs.
"Both of them have big dimples, a love of baseball and guitars and 'Frozen' is everything to them," Kyree's mother said. "We felt very connected."
She added that the Moraleses brought numerous ornaments she could remember this special Christmas and her "special angel, Arianna."
Aranna's mother Evelyn Morales told ABC News today that "it was really nice to get to meet this little girl who was so much like our daughter and was a fighter, too, just like Arianna."
Beachem said Kyree had been waiting five years for the small bowel, colon, liver and pancreas transplant after her bowel failed in 2010 and the resulting IV fluids she had to be on for 22 hours damaged her other organs.
She said "a true miracle" came to them in November when they found out she was finally going to get the organ donations she needed to possibly save her life. She added that she didn't know Arianna was the donor was until a friend of the Morales family heard Kyree's story on the news, recognized particular details in the story and connected the two families.
Evelyn Morales said Arianna passed away in November when she suddenly became ill. She added that Arianna had holoprosencephaly, a condition in which her brain did not properly grow and divide when she was a fetus, but she said she believes the condition was unrelated to her death.
"It's so hard to think Arianna's not here with us anymore, focusing on all the positive things coming from her life is amazing," Morales said. "She's raising awareness for organ donation and holoprosencephaly. She wasn't even expected to make it much past birth, but she did and showed people that they can have hope even with these terrible prognoses."
Kyree's mother agreed with Morales, saying on Facebook that she "never wanted a family to lose their child so that mine could live," but that the "Morales family wanted to see another child live if their angel was given her wings.
"Not only has Kyree been given that chance, but three other families are holding their child's hand because of Arianna's gift of life," she said on Facebook.
