Moriel Matalon is Managing Partner at Israel’s well known Gornitzky Law Office. In addition, he is chairman of Unicef- Israel, the local branch of the UN’s International Children’s Emergency Fund. He had climbed high on the ladder of success but his position did not intimidate the fiend named Cancer who arrived uninvited as a nightmare set to destroy Moriel’s life and that of his family. They were devastated. The doctors held out only one ray of hope: a bone marrow transplant. Would a genetically matching donor be found? In time? Before…? Mr. Matalon was among the fortunate ones. Avi Cohen, one among over 850,000 potential Ezer Mizion donors, was that match. It’s a year and a half later and a healthy Moriel met Avi for the first time. “It was exhilarating to find myself in the same room with a man whose life I personally had saved,” exclaimed Avi. Moriel hugged his benefactor in a wordless expression of gratitude for the gift that can never be paid back. As grateful as he and his family were, there remained the ‘missing piece’: the feeling of no possible way of repaying the unrepayable.
All that changed recently when Moriel re-entered the hospital doors, a place of so many memories. This time it was not with the trepidation of a very questionable future but to accompany his nephew who would be on the donating side, whose marrow will save the life of another Jew. The unrepayable was about to be paid back. The circle was being closed.
Rochie Meth, a key Ezer Mizion employee, writes: My everyday reality takes me through Ezer Mizion’s various departments and branches. There, I encounter a large number of sick people – people with physical maladies, mental illness, mobility impairments, and mental disabilities. Many days, I come home and cry over everything I’ve seen over the course of the day – the unending struggle that these patients and their family face! Their fear and anxiety over the future! The pressure of having to function in the midst of this volcanic eruption…
For many of them, illness knocks at the door as a totally unexpected surprise, interrupting rosy dreams and a marvelous life routine. For others, illness is a long, drawn-out agony, what people call “an unending chain of troubles.”
For all of them, it hurts, causes an upheaval, and is very, very difficult! Yet, in the midst of all this suffering, there are wonderful individuals among Ezer Mizion staff and volunteers, who have joined as one, warm, embracing family to envelop these people with love, with physical and emotional support, a family that thinks constantly how to make it easier for people to better deal with their health challenges.
Our greatest difficulty here at Ezer Mizion is when we are forced to say a final “good-bye” to those dear people, whom we loved very much…those that, in spite of all of our efforts, didn’t make it to the happy ending we had envisioned for them
However, our greatest joy is to see others who emerge from the sea of pain and come join us now as healthy volunteers to be on the giving end. Thank G-d, there are many of them!
Bone marrow recipients…bone marrow donors…people in need…people who give…receivers who regain their health and become givers…Ezer Mizion:
