Parents reflect on gift of life- their son's organs

It has occurred to Sandra Fritsche that her phone doesn't ring nearly as much anymore.

The silence that follows a child's death sort of surprises you, she said.

"There were always so many friends calling Nathan that I used to feel like an answering service," she said. "But that's the one thing I missed when he died -- the phone stopped ringing."

Sandra and her husband, Gerald, somehow -- during their darkest hour -- set aside their grief on Feb. 9, 2001, to ensure that another set of parents with whom they'd never meet would not suffer the same loss.

The silence created by the absence of their son, Nathan, 17, has motivated the rural Perryville, Mo., couple to fill the void by talking to others about the importance of organ and tissue donation.

On Friday, they visited the Cape Girardeau office of Mid-America Transplant Services to prepare for a Thursday evening event organized to recognize National Donate Life Month.

Sandra, 55, will speak at the gathering to be held at the Christ Episcopal Church parish, where organ and tissue donors, recipients and their families will be honored.

In their farm's garage sits a shiny, red 1942 Farmall M tractor. It was an FFA project that Nathan could not finish before he died two years ago in a pickup crash.

The tractor's gleaming grill and bright finish are evidence that it is cherished.

Nathan, a Perryville High School junior, never got to reassemble the hundreds of parts he spent hours cleaning and repairing. Instead, his classmates did it for him and presented the tractor to his parents as a Christmas present in 2001.

"I think it helped them get through their grief to do that for us," Sandra said.

At one point, the body shop teacher critiqued the tractor's red finish and made the students do it over, wanting it to be pristine for its presentation, Sandra said.

Until recently the tractor ran well, but it's developed an oil leak and the carburetor needs replacing. But it will run again, Gerald, 57, promises. "I'll take it out and use it, plant with it," he said.

His wife believes it's too pretty for farm work. It needs to be in a parade, she said. Many of the teens who worked on the tractor have become like family to the couple.

When those classmates graduated in May 2002, the Fritsches made appearances at a few parties but couldn't bear attending the graduation ceremony.

Phone call

On the night their son died, the family ate their dinner as they watched television together in the living room.

Nathan was anxious for his ride to arrive to take him to a party, his mother said. She warned him not to come home late and fall asleep on the couch watching TV, as was his habit.

"He just cocked his head at me, wearing a cap, and with a sheepish grin told me, 'Don't worry, I think I'll come home early tonight,'" she said.

It was 8:30 p.m., the last time they would see that smile.

When the phone rang an hour later, Gerald answered it in the living room. Sandra was in bed.

"I have to go," Gerald said, entering their bedroom.

"Why? What's wrong?" Sandra asked.

"Nathan's been in a car accident."

"Then I have to go too."

The Fritsches hurried to the scene on U.S. 61 where the truck crashed on a curve, near Uniontown.

They learned the driver tried avoid an oncoming car he thought was crossing lanes, but he overcorrected and hit a muddy embankment. The truck went up a hill, struck trees and rolled back one and a half times, landing on the cab.

Nathan was the last to be freed. He suffered a massive chest trauma and was taken to Southeast Missouri Hospital.

It was there that a doctor told the parents their son had died. They were in the hospital chapel when a woman working with Mid-America Transplant Services approached and asked if they would consent to donate Nathan's tissues.

The woman encouraged the family to discuss the decision among themselves in the chapel. They agreed to donate Nathan's heart valves.

The only reason they did not donate more was because they were in too much shock at his death to hear everything that was being said to them and they were unaware of what more could be possibly donated, Sandra said. At that moment, she still had trouble thinking of Nathan as anything but alive and couldn't bear the thought of his body being cut apart for harvesting.

"He was young, healthy and strong, and we wanted his memory to live on," Sandra said of their decision to donate Nathan's heart valves. "We would have donated more if we'd known more about what could be used."

Few are chosen

Brieta Church, the transplant agency's family services coordinator, says less than 1 percent of all deaths qualify for a vital organ donation, but significantly more can donate tissues, including heart valves, eye tissues, skin and bone.

The Fritsches requested Nathan's donation go to a young person. Weeks later they received a letter telling them one of his heart valves was successfully transplanted to an 8-year-old girl in northern Illinois.

"It was like a prayer that was granted to read that," Sandra said. "It was hard for us to give the gift, but we'd do it again."

Because organ and tissue donations are made under confidential conditions, the couple passed along a gift of life to another child they'll likely never embrace.

'Fearless'

The boy who taught himself to swim and started jumping off the Apple Creek bridge was "fearless," his mother said.

She misses the practical jokes too. Nathan would sneak up behind her, run his hand over her hair slightly, just enough to make it stand up, and then run away laughing.

"I was standing at the kitchen sink one day after he died and I could have sworn I felt his hand go across the top of my head, but it was just a memory," she said.

Since his death, the Fritsches have traded the role of being strong when the other suffers a setback.

"We're on different levels of dealing with it," Sandra said. "But that's OK, because when I'm weak, he's strong."

While Gerald has his farm work, Sandra's work has always been inside the home as a mother. Their other son, Jeff Fritsche, 34, and daughter Nicole Burger, 28, also have jobs to focus on, but everyone has dealt with their grief differently, Sandra said.

Most of Nathan's clothing was boxed and put in the basement, but his bedroom is still filled with his belongings and a collection of miniature tractors. A "farm country" scene he set up on a table in the basement remains untouched.

Jeff built a wooden white cross surrounded by a heart at the site of the crash. Supporters turned it into a shrine for Nathan with flowers and gifts.

"We farm the ground right next to where the cross is planted," Sandra said. "It was hard for Gerald to go by it because every time you think about it."

Today, when the Fritsches drive past the memorial, Sandra blows a kiss and Gerald makes the sign of the cross.

On Thursday night, Nathan's gift of life will be honored on a handmade panel sewn into a special quilt to be displayed at the transplant service's commemoration event. The quilt has a total of nine panels honoring donors from this area, Church said.

Nathan's panel will display his photo and images of a deer, wheat and a certain red tractor.

mwells@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 160