By Vanessa Vina
I grew up thinking organ donation was something to avoid. In my family, it wasn't something people talked about openly. And when they did, it was usually with criticism. I had also heard this echoed by fellow members of the Hispanic community. So I never questioned it.
Then I lost Steven.
Steven and I met in middle school. A few years after graduation we reconnected through social media. I knew then he was my person in every sense of the word. In 2013, he went to renew his ID, and when he came home, he was ecstatic to tell me he had signed up to be an organ donor. "I really want to help people," he told me. I called him crazy.
“You know that means doctors will pull the plug on you to use your organs,” I told him. I genuinely believed that. But Steven remained unwavering, proud of his donor status.
Four years later, on Oct. 9, 2017, he rushed out the door for work, forgetting to take his blood pressure medication. Before he left, he kissed his grandmother goodbye, something he usually never did.
We were talking on the phone while he was on his way to work on the commuter train when all of a sudden the call dropped. Bad connection, I figured. I tried calling back, but all I got was radio silence. I tracked his phone and it led me to a hospital. He had gone into cardiac arrest.
As soon as I reached his bedside he had a second cardiac arrest. Then a third. Throughout each of those traumatic events, I watched with my own eyes as the doctors and nurses tirelessly worked to save his life. There was never a moment when they were not trying to do everything in their power to save Steven.
But despite the efforts they exhausted, on Oct. 14, Steven passed away. He was 35 years old.
In the middle of all that grief, Steven's wish to donate was honored. His heart, liver, and lungs went to four people who needed them.
I didn't know what to do with that at first, so I just started writing letters to Steven’s recipients. I wrote every single day for three years. No one wrote back, but I kept going anyway.
Then, finally, I heard from the family of the man who received Steven's heart. We started exchanging letters, then phone calls, then Zoom calls during COVID. After everything opened back up, we met in person. His family was so warm, so grateful. I grew close with one of his daughters and we still spend time together.
Becoming part of the recipient's family changed everything for me. I saw firsthand what organ donation actually means. It gives someone else more time, more memories, more ordinary dinners around the table with their kids. Steven gave that to four families, and Michael's family gave me something back too: proof that my fiancé’s life meant something beyond the years he had.
After that, I became a donor myself because of Steven’s selfless and courageous decision. This was a life changing experience for me and that is why I became a Donate Life Florida Ambassador. I started showing up for other families going through what I had experienced and to encourage organ donation awareness.
I love speaking with Hispanic families especially, because I know their skepticism. I lived with the cultural discomfort around death, mistrust, and the feeling that organ donation is not for us. But I want those families to know that I’ve learned it is for us. Our loved ones deserve the chance to leave the kind of legacy Steven did.
We need more people to register as organ donors. We need pamphlets at the DMV, conversations at the doctor's office, and real stories like Steven’s being shared amongst the misinformation.
Steven made his decision in 2013, standing at the DMV counter with a big smile on his face, that he wanted to help people. Thanks to his decision, four people got the one invaluable thing you can’t receive otherwise: time.
Organ, eye and tissue donation is the gift of life. There is no better way to say it.
You may share some of the hesitations I once had about organ donation. If so, I urge you to learn more about what it really means to register as an organ, eye and tissue donor at DonateLifeFlorida.org.
Vanessa Vina is from Miami, Florida. Her late fiancé, Steven, saved three lives through organ donation after his passing in 2017.
