Joey MacDonald was only 18 months old when he started getting sick. After four visits to the local hospital in Napanee and no results, his mom Tanya took him to Kingston, where he would later be diagnosed with leukemia. It would take a number of years and trips to Toronto before a match was found for a bone marrow transplant.
“I would sit there and I would look out this big window and watch all the kids skateboard, ride their bikes and play hockey,” MacDonald said.
His donor match was found when he was the age of six. The moment he was told the transplant had worked, he said time stood still.
“When they said it was successful, I was the happiest kid. I was like, finally, I can do what these kids are doing,” said a now 13-year-old MacDonald.
Joey’s life saver, Kristina Zygmond, lives in Texas, and registered to become a donor when she was a member of the United States armed forces.
On Saturday May 5, almost seven years after the successful transplant, Joey and Kristina managed to schedule a meeting.
Zygmond says she was extremely nervous coming into the big day, but so happy that it worked out.
“I have a seven-year-old daughter and a three-year-old boy and I just can’t imagine what Tanya went through, to see your child go through something like that,” she said.
Being so young when diagnosed and while going through the whole process, Joey said he never fully understood the circumstances he was in. Luckily for him, he had the best support system of all — his mom.
“If I ever lost my mom I’d be lost, I don’t know what I would do, because she was there by my side 24/7,” said MacDonald.
Joey also wanted to thank the rest of his family and his friends for sticking with him throughout the whole process.
With more than enough hardship for a lifetime behind him, Joey says he is happy to just be a normal kid.
“I took a couple years of my life to survive, to be a kid and be who I am now.”
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