When Joanna Hayter, right, took ill from hereditary kidney disease, her friend Joanne Rivard, stepped up. Rivard gave her left kidney to Hayter Nov. 6 in an organ transplant performed at University Hospital. Here, only two days later, the pair recover together. (CRAIG GLOVER, The London Free Press)
They share a name, a birthday and a passion for softball.
But now Sarnia pals Joanna Hayter, 32, and Joanne Rivard, 42 — both born Sept. 24 — share something that will cement their friendship for life.
On Nov. 6, Rivard gave her left kidney to Hayter who learned a year ago that the kidney disease that has stalked her family for a generation, would not spare her.
“Joanne made me cry when she told me she wanted to give me a kidney,” Hayter recalled of that day — July 16, when a friend became a lifeline.
Recovering two days after the transplant at London’s University Hospital, the women recount how a friendship born on the softball field evolved into a bond like few others.
In September of last year Hayter thought she had the flu but blood work at Sarnia’s Bluewater Health emergency department confirmed this family’s worst fears.
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