{"id":7281,"date":"2025-01-23T12:33:14","date_gmt":"2025-01-23T17:33:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ezermizion.org\/blog\/?p=7281"},"modified":"2025-01-23T12:33:14","modified_gmt":"2025-01-23T17:33:14","slug":"what-i-never-signed-up-for-that","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ezermizion.org\/blog\/what-i-never-signed-up-for-that\/","title":{"rendered":"What? I Never Signed Up for That!"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Moral was just following the crowd. She had come to enlist in the army and saw others swabbing their cheek. She also did the same, not really understanding what she was signing up for. She had become a registrant for the Ezer Mizion Bone Marrow Registry but, amid the tumult of induction, didn\u2019t really understand what that meant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 It was only a few months later that she received a call from Ezer Mizion saying that she was a match for a cancer patient and asking if she would like to donate stem cells. Her reaction: \u2018What?! I never signed up for that\u2018.  But when she mentioned the call to others, they were aghast. \u201cWhat an opportunity!  To save someone\u2019s life! Of course, you should do it!\u201d And so bit by bit, she began to realize that this was real and very important. Ezer Mizion soon received a call retracting her earlier refusal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She publicized her upcoming donation on a chat and was deluged with replies. \u201cI never got so many good wishes, not even on my birthday!\u201d Not only that but many other young people registered because of me. I\u2019m beginning to understand how important this is.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Talya was ten years old when her idyllic childhood came crashing down. Suddenly math tests and jump rope we no longer the center of her life. Talya had leukemia. The encouraging smiles of the oncology team began to fade when nothing they tried was working. \u201cWe\u2019ll do a stem cell transplant. That will save your life. You\u2019re Jewish. We\u2019ll contact Ezer Mizion. They have 1.2 million Jewish people on their database. We\u2019re sure there will be a genetic match for you,\u201d they promised.  But the doctors were anything but sure. Even 1.2 million may not be enough.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Talya was one of the over five thousand fortunate ones. Moral, who hadn\u2019t even known what she was doing when she registered, was a perfect match. And now she sat in a comfortable recliner thinking of the person whose life she was saving. \u201cThis is the first time I\u2019m so worked up about meeting someone I don\u2019t even know. It\u2019s the first time I feel so connected and love a girl I never even saw. Do you look like me? Do we have similar characteristics? What dreams do you have? Are you as anxious to meet me as I am to meet you?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A year and a half later, after Talya recovered from the leukemia, the two girls met for the first time on stage in Binyanei Ha\u2019umah, at a special event for 3,000 Ezer Mizion volunteers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Moral said to Talya tearfully, \u201cFirst of all, I want to tell you that I\u2019m so thrilled to see you. I can\u2019t tell you how much I looked forward to this. I\u2019m so happy.\u201d Moral turned to the audience and said, \u201cI want to say \u2018Thank you\u2019 to Ezer Mizion for giving me the privilege of saving a life.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dena, Talya\u2019s mother, said: \u201cIn the midst of the nightmare, when we had almost given up hope, \u2013 suddenly, we were told that a matching donor had been found for her, it was the most exciting news in the world. Words cannot express how much I thank you for your amazing willingness to do this.\u201d<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"pinterest\"<\/a>\"linkedin\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Moral was just following the crowd. She had come to enlist in the army and saw others swabbing their cheek. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[95],"tags":[915,37,896],"class_list":["post-7281","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bone-marrow-registry","tag-bone-marow-transplant","tag-leukemia","tag-stem-cell-donation"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ezermizion.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7281","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ezermizion.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ezermizion.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ezermizion.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ezermizion.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7281"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ezermizion.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7281\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7282,"href":"https:\/\/ezermizion.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7281\/revisions\/7282"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ezermizion.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7281"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ezermizion.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7281"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ezermizion.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7281"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}