It was a chance encounter that ended up saving a life.
Nearly 20 years had passed since Clarkston resident Jerry Blackstone and Florida resident Kenneth Belsley, former Western Michigan University roommates, had been in touch.
But it wasn’t too long to help out a friend in need.
Blackstone, 45, was diagnosed with kidney disease in 1996. He was having headaches and noticed a difference in his urine, so he went for testing which determined the disease. At that time both kidneys were 50 percent deteriorated.
“I wasn’t really surprised. It’s in my family. My father died at 31 of the disease, five years before they had dialysis.” His sister also found out she had high protein in her urine, but never was diagnosed with the disease.
“My reaction was to deal with it,” Blackstone said, who has lived in Clarkston since 1997 and has four kids, Kristin, 22, Tommy, 20, Nick, 17, and Chad, 13. “If you’re dealt a hand, you just deal with it. My positive mental attitude is very strong. You choose your attitude. My favorite quote is ‘Attitudes are contagious. Is yours worth catching?’”
Diagnosis brought on a restricted low sodium, low protein diet and medication for the next three years. Within another year he was on dialysis three days a week, four hours a day.
Remaining positive, Blackstone said, “Dialysis doesn’t mean life has to stop. Theoretically you are considered handicap. But I didn’t slow down.” A sales manager for Hilti, a construction tool and supply company where he has been employed for 22 years, Blackstone took his computer and cell phone to dialysis and continued to work.
His attitude was so impressive, a doctor at dialysis asked Blackstone to talk with other patients who weren’t handling their diagnosis as well, and he did.
Dialysis continued for three years.
Blackstone had been placed on a donor recipient list and had seven people step up as a potential donor, including wife Lori, who was the first to be tested. Though she was a blood type match, she was dismissed because of a minor problem.
“They take great care in that donors are perfect,” she said.
Some potential donors Blackstone had just met, which particularly touched him. One of Lori’s longtime girlfriends’ husband offered to donate his kidney, and Blackstone and he had never met until one recent New Years Eve party.
“These gestures are deep,” Blackstone said, “It made me look at things a little differently about coming to one’s side to help them. They are giving up a part of their body to help another, it’s phenomenal.”
Meanwhile, Belsley, who is in heavy commercial construction, ran across a Hilti employee on Belsley’s work site last fall. It was revealed he was a former co-worker of Blackstone. So, Belsley got Blackstone’s phone number and decided to call and catch up.
In September 2002, “I was sitting at dialysis doing my work when I got a call on my cell phone. It was my old college roommate seeing how I was doing. He had no idea (about the kidney disease).”
“Generally I don’t discuss my health issues, but in catching up I told him about my health. He didn’t say anything (about becoming a donor) at that time. We just caught up and exchanged numbers.”
A week later, Belsley called and asked, “How do I go about seeing if I’m a donor match.”
“It was not a hard decision to make. Jerry’s a great guy. It was my responsibility to help out at the time,” Belsley said, who was raised in Michigan, now lives just east of Tampa, and is the father of Jessica, 16, Jennelle, 12 and Morgan, 8. “If I have the opportunity to help someone out, I’ll do it.”
“It was unbelievable,” Blackstone said. “Someone I hadn’t talked to for years. And he was really confident this would happen and we could do this.”
“I had a gut feeling we could do this,” Belsley, 45, said, who beginning in November went through about six months of testing.
“I told him at any time he could change his mind,” Blackstone said.
“I did have second thoughts. I couldn’t believe it was really happening. But I was not not gonna do it,” Belsley admitted.
On January 16, 2003 Blackstone received a call that there was a cadaver donor and he was needed at the hospital in two to three hours. Blackstone called family and friends. He called Ken to tell him he was “off the hook.”
But not too long after, the hospital called back. There was a mistake. The cadaver had Hepatitis C, which they had missed before calling Blackstone.
“It was so hard calling everyone back, especially Ken.”
It eventually got down to the final scan test for Belsley. Blackstone said, “Finally I asked, I just had to, I said, ‘Have you heard about the scan?’
Belsley said he would call back in a few minutes after he called the hospital.
“He called back in five minutes and says to me, ‘How does May 14 sound?’ I said, ‘What do you mean?’”
“To do the surgery,” Belsley clarified.
Blackstone’s reaction was a simple, “Excuse me?” May 14 was only two weeks away. He expected at least a month to schedule a surgery.
“I said, ‘Okay, May 14 sounds wonderful.’ And that was it.”
On Wednesday morning, May 14, Belsley went into a two and a half hour surgery, prior to Jerry’s three and a half hour surgery at the University of Michigan Medical Center in Ann Arbor.
Afterwards Belsley and Blackstone passed each other on stretchers in the hospital. “We did it brother,” Belsley said.
But in recovery, Blackstone’s kidney began functioning improperly. “That was my biggest fear, that Ken did all this and now it wasn’t working.”
After the fourth day in the hospital, though, the kidney started to respond again and Blackstone was sent home after four more days. Since then, recovery has been “a piece of cake.”
The story was not the same for Belsley who had severe complications following the surgery. After being sent home, he was rushed to the hospital where it was found he had bile fluid in his blood. “I was in major pain. There was definitely fear going through me.”
Blackstone said, “I couldn’t enjoy a successful transplant because I’m home and the donor is in the hospital.”
Belsley was released after a 10 day stay. Recovery has been long for Belsley, and just in the last couple of weeks he has been feeling back to normal.
After everyone was back on their feet again, the Blackstones hosted a “Celebrate Life” party, to have the extended Belsley and Blackstone families meet each other. “It was real nice, very emotional.”
“We feel like we are so blessed to have this miracle happen,” Lori said. “Jerry handled the whole thing so amazingly. He has a tremendous positive attitude. He never once complained. He is an inspiration to me because of his courage.”
Lori said she hopes her husband’s story inspires others to do what Belsley did. “How many lives could be saved?”
“It’s a tremendous feeling helping someone like that; life changing,” Belsley said.
In college, Belsley and Blackstone had thought it ironic they both had Suzuki 500 motorcycles. After graduation, Blackstone gave the bike to his roommate for parts.
“He brought that up to me. Here it is 20 years later and he says, ‘You gave me motorcycle parts, now I’m giving you body parts.’ We laughed at that. What an analogy.”