Organ donation: 'To think Tony lives on in four people is amazing'

Four people will be sitting down to their Christmas lunch this year thanks to a young man they have never met.This is because living inside them are organs they received after the family of Tony Carlin agreed they could be donated shortly after he died.Although the pain of his death still overwhelms his grieving mother Eilis, the fact parts of the civil servant live on in other people gives her a great sense of comfort.Tony died when he was just 25 years old on July 29, 2019.In the blur of the moments after his admission to Letterkenny Hospital in his native Donegal, she remembers being approached by a nurse and asked if organ donation was something he had discussed.As it happens, the whole family had discussed the issue around the kitchen table when Tony was in his late teens.“It just came up,” Eilis said.“I can’t remember if it was something that had been on the radio or was it an article we read in a paper, but it came up.“I was there in the kitchen with Tony and his brother Ronan.“Tony was very, very clear on the issue and said that not only did he believe in it for himself but he believed others should be donors as well.“Little did I ever think that I would ever have to have the conversation I ended up having with Ronan and that ICU nurse back in 2019.“It is all a bit of a blur, and I can’t remember exactly what anybody said other than the fact that myself and Ronan told them that Tony would have wanted his organs to be donated to others.” Tony with his mother Eilis.While those who benefitted from his lungs, his kidneys, his liver and pancreas may well still be alive to enjoy Christmas lunch because of him, the very day itself makes Eilis shudder.“Tony loved Christmas, so I feel the loss even more at this time of the year,” she said.“As a result, while I used to love Christmas, I now absolutely loathe it and I actually go away and stay with a friend who understands.“Nothing is the same anymore."So this year, she again will leave the bedroom in the bungalow where Tony grew up and which he shared with his brother Ronan, who lives in Australia, where he is on a temporary career break.When she is at home, hardly a day goes by when she doesn’t stand at the doorway, look over to Tony’s bed on the right of the room.She usually goes over to the bed and either sits on it or lies down on it in the silence that surrounds the anguish and pain she still feels to this day.She can see his framed Manchester United photos, and a Lord of the Rings poster, his huge and jumbled collection of books, his old TV and his PlayStation, and she plays back conversations they would have had when he was alive.The room is exactly as it was since the day he last left it, and it will forever remain that way.His brother may return and stay there briefly again when he comes back from Australia but Eilis expects he will eventually find a place of his own and move out.Aside from the home and her own personal memories, a group of Tony’s friends have made a point since his death of including Eilis in the landmarks in their lives that her son never got to live.“When there are birthdays, or weddings, or things like that, a number of them will invite me,” she said.“I don’t always go because it isn’t always easy to face up to a situation where you are likely to attend something Tony never got to do himself.“But it is really lovely and special to me that his friends recognise that these landmarks are important to me and they make a point of including me.” She added: “Until you go through it, nobody can ever really understand the pain of losing a child. To lose a child is so crippling and devastating, and a part of you dies with them. “There are many, many dark days, and sometimes it is really hard to keep on the right side of the line.“But I suppose I am so proud of him. He was such a generous young man.“You know, in life, he was really sensitive, giving, loving, caring, and I'm so proud of him that he's left a legacy.Tony with his brother Ronan, left.That there are four people out there in the world with a piece of her son living inside them fills her with a never ending source of comfort.“It is just so absolutely amazing,” she said.“Tony’s loss is just so bad, so overwhelming, so traumatic and so colossal that you do strive for any glimpse of comfort.“Knowing that parts of him live on, and that there are these four people who are enjoying better quality of life, or even a life, because of him is tremendous.” Every year, she makes a point — as do her own family — of attending the Irish Kidney Association’s Annual Service of Remembrance and Thanksgiving.“It is hard to put it into words what the impact of that day is to me and to all of us. But it is a very special day.“It's so poignant when you see the people who have received an organ and the impact it has on them to keep them going and to lead fuller lives.“I’ve met all sorts of people whose lives have been absolutely transformed. You really get to know the impact organ transplants have on people when you actually meet and see the recipients. “To me personally, as someone who will never get over Tony’s death, and as someone who so misses him desperately, knowing what has happened to four lives because of him fills me with a sense of pride and joy.“In a sense, a part of him lives on in this world and that really, really helps me deal with the fact that he is gone.” She hopes all four of those who received his organs are living their lives and are in good health.“I’d love to meet them, or at least hear from them,” she said.“I'd love to hear that they're doing well, obviously you've got to respect someone's privacy, and you can't know the details of what went where.“But I do know that some recipients do contact donor families through the organ donation service.“It can take years apparently because it's a long process having to take anti-rejection and anti-viral medication.” Recalling the conversation she had with Tony all those years ago at the kitchen table with his brother Ronan, she says it is one everyone needs to have.“Not only should people talk about it among the family members, but people should definitely keep the lines of communication open,” she said.“People should revive it from time to time, because people do change their minds.“They might decide one thing in their teenage years, but change their point of view in their adult years. The importance of this is so that anybody faced with that awful moment when they are asked about their loved ones' organs, there can be no doubt about what their intentions were. “Tony was in no doubt at all, and it was therefore an easier decision for myself and Ronan to make at the time.“I will add one last thing, and at the risk of repeating myself, knowing what happened to Tony’s organs has brought me great comfort.“To think that Tony lives on in four other people is just amazing. It's amazing.” For further information on organ donation, contact the Irish Kidney Association on ika.ie

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