neighbors
A Second Chance
Pompton Lakes’ father receives more than a new heart
A STRONG BOND Since Thomas Eliezer (left)
received the heart of Gerry Mead’s wife,
Barbara, the two men and their families have
become involved with NJ Sharing Network and
its fundraising and awareness events.
Eliezer was given the opportunity to
reach out to his donor’s family, which
he did.
A letter from the Sharing Network
notified Mead that the man who had
received his late wife’s heart wanted
to meet him.
“I said I would love to talk to him.
This is what I’ve been looking for. It
really made my holiday that year just
knowing that this gentleman had a
heart transplant from my wife and
he’s still living and everything is
good,” says Mead.
Eliezer, the father of
two girls, learned his
donor was a mom
and had worked
for a school sys-
tem. There were
2,500 people at
her funeral, and
Holly Glen Elementary School
donated a garden in her honor.
The two men and their fami-
lies met in January 2016, and
since that time, they have grown
closer.
“My daughter ran out of the
elevator and hugged Gerry,”
Eliezer says of that first meeting.
“All this happened because
Barbara wanted to donate her
organs. The gratitude I have for
Barbara, I can’t talk enough
about.”
Mead, 55, says he and his
wife, who died in a 2015 acci-
dent at age 52, were married for
29 years. They have two sons, ages
32 and 22.
Eliezer brought a stethoscope with
him so they could hear Barbara’s
heart beating inside of him.
“My wife is gone physically...but
still she lives within him. And after
seeing his two
Submit your ideas for
little girls, I
know that he
to [email protected]
could not have
been a more
deserving person to receive this heart,
and his wife and family are just
tremendous people. I’m very blessed
to have them in my life right now.”
Barbara Mead is honored with a
personalized butterfly on the NJ
Sharing Network’s Landscape of
Life, created to honor organ
and tissue donors, trans-
plant recipients and
members of the com-
munity, and to
acknowledge contri-
butions made in
their names. ■
WANT TO
LEARN MORE
ABOUT ORGAN
DONATION?
VISIT NJSHARINGNETWORK.ORG
OR ORGANDONOR.GOV.
12
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neighbors
I
t’s been about two years
since Pompton Lakes’
Thomas Eliezer received a
life-saving heart transplant.
Since then, the 47-year-old
and his family have
become very close to his donor’s
family.
This type of connection is
uncommon, says Eliezer, who
spoke at a NJ Sharing Network
event with Gerry Mead, the wid-
ower of his heart donor, Barbara
Mead.
The event recognized organ
and tissue donors, transplant
recipients, and members of the
community who support the organi-
zation. The two told their stories in
emotional speeches through tears and
laughter. They remarked on their
unique and now strong friendship,
and they urged support for organ
donation and the NJ Sharing
Network.
Eliezer received a heart transplant
after a major heart attack, heart fail-
ure and a series of heart issues in the
months that followed. He was in and
out of the hospital 17 times. He had
an implanted defibrillator that mal-
functioned, a valve replacement, and
heart pumps that failed. His situation
was so dire that he remained at
Newark Beth Israel Medical Center
until a heart became available.
When his doctors gave him the
good news that he would receive a
new heart, “My brother started
balling and my wife started crying,”
Eliezer says. “Early morning, they put
it in, and the next day, I walked. It’s
just a miracle.”
In the months that followed,
WRITTEN BY JAI AGNISH