A Long Island mother met the woman who received her daughter’s kidney Tuesday at North Shore University Hospital.
Ava Jacobs’ 27-year-old daughter Alexis was killed in June during a skydiving jump that went off course. Ava watched the jump, but did not realize something had gone terribly wrong.
“By the time I got to the trauma center, I was told there was no hope for her,” she says.
Ava followed her daughter's wishes and donated her organs, asking on social media if anyone was in need. Sherryl Garry, who happened to be Alexis' math teacher in seventh grade saw the post and thought of her sister Linda Dollinger.
Dollinger was in kidney failure and the family had been searching for a donor.
A direct kidney donation was arranged after doctors at North Shore University Hospital discovered it was a match.
“Without Alexis, I would not be here,” Dollinger says.
Jacobs says her daughter’s organs helped rescue the lives of six people. She says “it was the first and only thing to offer a degree of comfort” in the aftermath of her loss.