andrewschlecht

[andrewschlecht]

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On June 20th, 2015, I woke up with the hymn “Great is Thy Faithfulness” in my head. Not like a normal, I have a song stuck in my head, sort of way. It was more like it was blaring in my head, but a peaceful kind of blaring. It may have been the fact that it was 4:00am and that is not a normal time for me to be up. I tend to lean more to the fact that it was one of those moments in life where you know God is letting you know he is there. This was the day I was giving one of my kidneys (turns out my left) to my father in law Dave. It was a decision that I felt was guided and planned by God.

Dave, medically, is no more than a random person. The odds of two random people being a match for a kidney is less than 5%. I felt the compelled to get tested anyway. Dave is a mentor, friend, and a wonderful father in law. He is also a great Papa to my two boys. I couldn’t imagine life without him. Both his kidneys were failing, and he was soon to be on dialysis. The average person on dialysis lives about 5 years, and it’s extremely difficult. So when I found out I was a match it was a no brainer.

I went through a few days of testing over several weeks, and they found me fit to donate. I was asked probably over billion times by my wife, Dave, and the doctors if I was sure I wanted to do it. I always felt peace about the decision so I never felt the need to waver. Throughout the testing I only told a few people about it. Mostly because I didn’t want to announce to the world that I was going to get tested to do something that statistically a long shot. But when I found out I was a match I still felt weird about telling people. I told a few friends about it, and of course my family.

Everyone was supportive, some apprehensive just for my safety, but very supportive. It was just something I knew I was created to do. I didn’t feel scared. I just felt like it was something I needed to do. Easy as that. I also had a friend, Cole Chesney, who had given a kidney to his Dad about 6 months earlier. Talking with him also brought peace.

Back to the morning of the surgery. God was with me. He just was. I arrived at the hospital and went back and put on one of those awkward hospital gowns. My wife and kids came to pray with me and be with me before I went back. A couple good friends, Jeremy Miller and Jason Smith, plus Amy, Dave, and one of his pastors were there to pray with me before I went back. It was one of those moments in life you will never forget. It meant the world to me for those special people to be there.

Shortly after that I was informed that the doctor was going to be late. This is typically a bad thing, but today it wasn’t. It allowed time for me to see my parents and sister before the surgery. The doctor was stuck in traffic or had car trouble or something, but that time was valuable. It gave me more time with my kids before as well which was really special.

The next thing I remember a couple nurses started prepping me for surgery and a nurse said, “Take this. These are the drugs your parents told you not to take” I chuckled and then I was out……….. I woke up in what I think was the same room, but could have been on a different planet for all I knew. I was high as a kite. I remember waking up talking. Just talking. The a couple nurses were there to make sure I was ok. No one I knew was there. They told me before surgery that family wouldn’t be able to come back to recovery, but at the time that didn’t matter. I started semi yelling for them to get my wife. After roughly 7 minutes of strange quasi yelling they went and got her.

For the next 30 or so minutes I continued talking. I guess this is what I do when I’m on these kind of drugs. My chosen topic was what I was thankful for. I rambled on about my wife and kids. My parents, brother, and sisters. Dave and Jenni (my in laws). My job at White Fields. My church. My podcast bros (DTD pod), and just how much I was thankful for everything. I remember this barely, but my wife continued to remind me of this.

After the initial wake up and drug induced ramblings some reality set it. This hurt. I couldn’t sit up. I’m super uncomfortable, mostly because of gas. (… on that.. To be able to see everything in my abdomen they had to blow it up with air.. this is what I was told.. so that’s where the gas came from.. they can’t get all the gas out after surgery) The gas can travel around your body, like a pain in your shoulder could be “gas pain” which is way different than the gas pain I was used to. I had several visitors that day. My parents and mother in law came to see me. Pastors and a few friends. An awkward encounter with another family member and I was ready to try and sleep.

I didn’t sleep at all the first night. I was on pain meds and binge watching Friday Night Lights on my phone, so not a horrible circumstance, but still I was in pain. I heard getting up and walking around is important so I tried to get up that night around 1:00am… but I guess the nurse was new and he didn’t have any clue how to help me up. After a few failed tries, I told him I’ll wait until tomorrow.

The next day I was able to get up. I walked a few laps and went to say hi to Dave who was down and across the hall. I also had several visitors. My wife of course. My friend Jay came, my aunt, and some other friends. It was nice. My friend Jason who came to visit also came that day. He brought me two gifts. One an Anthony Davis action figure, and book Outliers by Malcom Gladwell. He told me that what I did is going to define what it means to be a “Schlecht” for generations to come, and that what I did made me an “outlier” of a person. Those words meant so much to me. I will never forget that moment. I was weeping. Jason and I hadn’t been friends long. But God has a way of bringing people into your life when you need them. This is totally the case with Jason.

I got to go home after 3 days in the hospital. I remember feeling horrible when they told me I was good to go home. I thought, “WHAT?! I CAN’T POSSIBLY BE READY TO GO HOME YET?!” It was fine though. My wife came to get me, with a Braums chocolate malt in hand. You know I’m not feeling great when I don’t demolish a chocolate malt from Braums, but I wasn’t feeling well enough to drink it. But that is my wife. Always thinking of me.

I want to take a moment to brag on my wife, Amy Schlecht. She was incredible throughout this whole process. If you don’t know me at all, my wife and I have two kids (at the time 3 and almost 11 months). Taking care of young kids is tough. That may have been one of my only apprehensions about the whole thing, is the pressure it would put on my wife. I couldn’t pick up my kids or bend over for weeks. She would have to do it ALL, and she did. She did it with a smile on her face. She did it gracefully. She did it with a servants heart. I can never thank her enough for how she handled that month.

When I was home we had meals brought to us nearly everyday for a month. The response from our friends, coworkers, and family was astonishing. My friend Alex Speers even bought me the newest NBA 2k video game. He lives in Portland and had it shipped to me. He and my friend Luke Stephens came to visit me together. Two of my oldest friends. I’ll never forget that day for that and several other reasons I don’t care to share in this post.

Again… Jason Smith…. brought over another gift. If you know me at all you know I love basketball. NBA basketball to be exact, and if you could zero in on a player it would be Shaquille O’Neal. The gift was an entire box of unopened 1992 NBA cards. We sat and opened every pack. We laughed about players. We freaked out about players we loved, and overall just had a great time. Another thing (I feel like I say this a lot) I’ll never forget.

Something I wasn’t prepared for was the impact this would have on other people.. well besides Dave… There was an article printed in the Daily Oklahoman about the procedure so more people found out about it than I was truly comfortable with. This lead to an interaction with a neighbor. In fact with my next door neighbor’s friend.. So not even really my neighbor. I heard the doorbell ring and my wife had taken the boys down to our neighborhood pool. So I slowly got up and went to the door. There stood my neighbors friend who I only kind of knew. (back story. She was in a terrible accident about a year prior that kept her out of work and left her physically not the same… sad deal) She looked at me and started to cry. I was in a drug induced state at that point in time so I didn’t know what to do. She said to me, “What you did… gives me hope in the world again”… wow.. I had no idea how to respond. I think I said, “Really?” but then gave her a hug. I had no clue what God had in store. It was truly humbling.

Another story, but several months later. I work at White Fields. We are a home for abused and neglected boys ages 8-18. I am the education coordinator. One of my jobs is to teach our boys in the transitional classroom. All the boys there are not fit to be in public school. They are too violent, curse too much, won’t do their work, and bring a host of problems to the table. A particular boy did not like school when he came to us. In fact he hated it. Not only did he hate school… he hated me. For about a month he would refuse to work with me. He’d cuss me out daily. Try to hurt me. I tried everything I knew. I was out of ideas. I just thought if I stayed consistent it would pay off. One day I was beginning class and for some reason I opened up with, “Does anyone have anything they’d want to say before we start the day?”… this boy that hated me raised his hand, and I was like… oh boy… here we go… the words out of his mouth are some that…. wait for it… I’ll never forget. He said,

“You’re a good man Mr. Andrew”

I said…. huh? What are you talking about? Is this a prank? He replied that he heard what I did, and that he respected me for it. My relationship with this boy changed that day and that moment. I was able to form a good relationship with him. God had a plan.

A year later Dave and I are recovered from the surgery. Dave’s recovery was slower than mine, but overall he feels better than he has in years. At a recent appointment, he was told his labs looked like that of an 18 year old. Incredible. Dave and I were able to complete a 5K together in the fall, and in April my wife and I completed the Memorial half marathon. The only real ramification is I can no longer become a swim suit model. The scar left on my stomach isn’t terrible, but would take too much photo shop for me to pursue that career.

I want to encourage anyone who has thought about donating to do so. It will change your life and those around you for the better. You can help someone live a longer fuller life. Please call me if you have questions or doubts or anything. I’d love to talk about it. God is faithful.

Great is Thy faithfulness! Great is Thy faithfulness! Morning by morning new mercies I see. All I have needed Thy hand hath provided, Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me!