October 13, 2024 • 41 mins
We’re proud to share a handful of recent interviews from our guests. The Grind is dedicated to exceptional conversation, and will always go above and beyond to make sure you have a platform to tell your story. If you’ve had experience you want to share with with us, please get in touch - we’d love to hear it.
Host: DJ Retro
Instagram: @DJRETRO1990
Instagram: @THEGRINDLV
One Kidney Club Las Vegas: @ONEKIDNEYCLUBLVN (Founder Mrs. Parriett)
Website: www.thegrind.online (AD Space Available)
Guest: Harold Mintz (Kidney Donor)
Instagram: @HaroldsHairOld
Email: haroldharold13@yahoo.com
Website www.DudeWheresMyKidney.com
Facebook / harold.mintz
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-grind-podcast-w-host-dj-retro--3511504/support.
Host: DJ Retro
Instagram: @DJRETRO1990
Instagram: @THEGRINDLV
One Kidney Club Las Vegas: @ONEKIDNEYCLUBLVN (Founder Mrs. Parriett)
Website: www.thegrind.online (AD Space Available)
Guest: Harold Mintz (Kidney Donor)
Instagram: @HaroldsHairOld
Email: haroldharold13@yahoo.com
Website www.DudeWheresMyKidney.com
Facebook / harold.mintz
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-grind-podcast-w-host-dj-retro--3511504/support.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Not any way you can.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
How many you'll give it a night?
Speaker 3 (00:05):
So I'm both to go on, so full away, Lady.
Speaker 4 (00:12):
Lendygo.
Speaker 1 (00:16):
Hello everyone. My name is Valerie Perier and I'm the
founder of the One Kidney Club, Las Vegas, Nevada. You
can find us on Facebook at one Kidney Club Las Vegas,
Nevada or Instagram. Our Instagram handle is one Kidney Club
lv N. Our email address is One Kidney Club LVN
at gmail dot com. If you would like to learn
more information on how you can become a living kidney donor,
(00:38):
please visit the National Kidney Registry at Kidney Registry dot com.
Speaker 5 (00:46):
Here we are another episode of The Grind.
Speaker 3 (00:50):
Thanks for joining us, King, I'm your host, James Perrier.
Speaker 5 (00:54):
This podcast is going to take us on the trip, trips.
Speaker 3 (00:58):
And places and moments of my life where I discovered
hip hop artists and you.
Speaker 5 (01:04):
All ready to go, Let's hit it life live. I
got your fier soon this Perrier press play.
Speaker 2 (01:23):
The Grind starts, the rhyme starts.
Speaker 5 (01:25):
We come together like car parks to make you move. Y'alls,
are life gonna help you out on this little bit.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
Ruis the preface to enlighten you with all we do
flaws exposure you. If you selp can get Jim poster
to poster, we poster help.
Speaker 5 (01:38):
Each other out, no doubt for disclosure.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
Get tuned into the Grind. It's time we take it
over and it's it's life.
Speaker 5 (01:44):
On your line.
Speaker 3 (01:45):
The guests of the Grind, welcome back to another podcast
here with your host DJ Retro. Here at the Grind
and you can find us at the grind dot online.
I have to tell you this evening, I have a
guest with us that's gonna share his phenomenonal story about donation.
(02:07):
And you might be some things might be going through
your mind right now saying, hey, what kind of donation
you know? Clothing? Or is it food or is it whatnot?
And those are the things that we actually think about
when we hear that word, sometimes a church. But man,
this story is awesome. Introduced to me by my wife
who has donated and they have this in common. But
(02:29):
we're gonna get right into the podcast. We're going to
respect his time. He's really busy tonight, but I like
to introduce you to a very special guest, mister Harold Mints.
How are you doing tonight, Harold?
Speaker 4 (02:43):
I'm doing great. I'm doing better now that I'm chatting
with you.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
Thanks so much, no problem. Once again, i'd like to
say thank you. I know you're busy and you made time,
and with the time difference, we got it to work.
But tonight it's not about me or the show is
actually about you because you have a captivating story of donations.
So at this time I'm going back off and let
(03:07):
you introduce yourself and let the listeners know why you
are here, why you accepted our invite to be on
a show tonight.
Speaker 4 (03:14):
Well, absolutely, so let me break the rules of storytelling
and go straight to the last chapter. So right back
in the year twenty about twenty four years or so ago,
I found myself in a hospital at Georgetown University in Washington, DC,
where a team of transplant surgeons wheeled me into an
(03:36):
operating room. They knocked me out, they cut me open,
They took out my left kidney. They put it in
beer cooler filled with ice. Somebody put that beer clue
in the back of their car, drove across town to
a different hospital where a different team of transplant surgeons
took my kidney and put it inside of someone I
(03:58):
didn't know, and it never met before for and so
as odd as that may be for me, at least
it was the natural progression of a line of thought
that had started a couple years before. So I ended
up being one of the first people in the country
who raised their hand and said, hey, I got an
(04:18):
extra one. Get this whoever needs it the most. And
I got to tell you, when I first said that
to the medical community in the Washington, DC area, I
was shocked at the responses. You know what they told
me the first time, you can't do that. It's illegal.
I mean, I go, I mean, I said, well, have
you ever heard of something called the waiting list? I
(04:40):
said yeah, And they said, well, it's run by the
federal government and if you needed a heart or a lung,
or a kid near whatever organ you might be in
need of, that the knee goes to the federal government
and they go to their list and they keep this
running list. That's how old you are, how sick you are,
how long you've been on the waiting list, and based
(05:01):
upon a bunch of factors, it kind of sees you
you're number one, you're number two, etc. And they said
to me, you said you wanted to give your kidney
to somebody who needs it the most in Washington, d C.
And they said, well, what happens if somebody in Wilmington, Delaware?
Is next time the list and you said you want
to give it to somebody in DC. It's like the
protocols that the government set up. And so sorry, mister Mints,
(05:24):
you can't do that today. But at the end of
the call kind of made me laugh a little, but
they said, but if he give us your name and
contact information, if anything ever changes, will call you. In
my head, I'm thinking, yeah, sure you will. Guess what.
Two years later, my phone rings and I go and
I go, hey, is the Harald Mintz who said he
wanted to give his kidney away? And I said, whoa
(05:47):
slow down. I didn't say I want to do it.
I said I was curious and I had questions and
I was considering doing it. And they said, well, guess what.
The very first program in the country that allows people
to donate the people they don't know has just been established,
and it happens to be in the Washington, DC area,
and if you want, you can come in and ask questions.
(06:10):
And I remember going, wow, okay, So I wrote a
book it's in my scrapp Now. I wrote up about
a dozen questions. So let me ask you something. Let's
say you're getting ready to have surgery next week to
give your kidney away. What do you want to ask
the doctors? What are some of the questions you want
to ask?
Speaker 3 (06:28):
Wow, I think one of the questions is what's the
impact of my health after I donate a kidney?
Speaker 5 (06:36):
Yeah, that's a little shit question, right.
Speaker 4 (06:38):
Yeah, you know that's on my listics. Here's how I
asked it. What are the chances I'm not waking up
from that surgery? You know what's going to happen? And
actually they told me if it's not emergency, if it's
planned out at a time. At the time, they told
me it was about one in three thousand people might
not wake up from that surgery. And I'm thinking, well,
that's no problem. Today I think, well that's not nothing.
(07:02):
But at the time I thought that's no problem. And
I said, I like fried food. I like you know,
fried fish, fried chicken, and all kinds of stuff. Can
I still do that? And they said, well, your heart
won't love you if you keep you know, eating fry food.
But your kidney no problem. Okay, I'm not a heavy drinker,
but every once in a while I'll have a glass
of wine or a beer. Is that okay? They went, Yeah,
(07:25):
your liver won't love you too much if you overdo
that over too much. But again, your kidneyat no problem. Okay,
how about this one. I'm going to go to the
beach next summer. If I'm walking on the beach, our
people are going to look at me and freak out,
like I'm Frankenstein. Am I going to be scarred up?
They say, no, Actually, there's this new way we do
these surgeries and most people won't even notice it. So
(07:46):
I went through all these questions and nothing they said
to me freak me out. I'm like, okay, what do
we do next? What do you think? The very first
medical test that they asked me to.
Speaker 3 (07:57):
Do was I'm gonna ask you and say, hey, did
ask you to a DNA test or match test?
Speaker 4 (08:06):
You know? It's interest. That's a really interesting question that
came later on. The very first test wasn't he in
a jar? Which I had to do a million times?
It wasn't give blood? You're ready for this. The very
first medical thing was they sent me to a psychiatrist,
which made me laugh, like what kind of knucklehead wakes
up in the morning and says, you know what I'm
(08:26):
gonna do today, I'm gonna start giving up body parts
to strangers. It's like nobody does that, And so I said,
I'm happy to do that. So about a week or
so later, I go to this psychiatrist's office and the
first thing she says to me is whould you like
to sit in the chair or should like to lay
down on this couch? And I'm already thinking, gee, she's
judging me if I choose one versus the other. And
(08:48):
so they sat out in the chair and I spent
about half an hour with her, and she wanted to
find out what my motivation was. And you know, that's
a good question, because today I couldn't even tell you
what makes somebody want to do this? But I said, well,
ever since high school. You know, I gave blood when
I was in high school, not because I'm a nice guy,
not because I want to donate anything. But I got
(09:11):
to class and the teacher said, we're having an assembly today.
You can either stay in class and take a quiz
or you can go to the assembly. Whoa that's an
easy one. I don't want to take a quiz. I'm
going to go to the assembly. Like the rest of
the class. We walk down. Normally, the assemblies are a
gym or an auditorium. This particular assembly was in the cafeteria,
(09:32):
and I'm like, that's odd. I walk in there and
the first thing I see is a bunch of my
classmates and they're laying down on let's call them cots
or pits. They had needles on their arm and they're
giving blood. I'm like, wait a minute, this isn't an assembly.
This is poking, needles and blood donation. And the teacher said, well, look,
you don't have to do it, but you go back
(09:54):
and take the quiz. So, for the first time in
my life, I rolled up my sleeve. I gave a
pine of blo blood. And after I gave a pint
of blood, the captain of the cheerleaders gave me a cookie,
and I'm like, wow, I get to lay down, I
don't have to take any quizzes, and the captain of
the cheerleaders has given me baked goods. I'll give blood
every day if they asked me too. This was a
(10:15):
good thing for me. And so from there. So I
shared that with her and she said, well, okay, any
other levers in your life that led you this way?
And I went through a few, so I'll do it
really quickly with him. My father passed a long time
ago that he was like fifty five, who was young,
and they couldn't fix what it was. It wasn't money
(10:37):
that killed him. It wasn't that way, he didn't have
enough money. It was the doctors knew exactly what to
do to fix them, they just didn't have enough parts
on the shelf. For example, if somebody right now, why
you and I are having this conversation, fifteen to twenty
people die in the US every day because they're waiting
for a kidney. The doctors know exactly what to do
(11:00):
to fix these people. You go to the shelf, you
take a kidney that matches your blood type and everything,
and they put it in you. But the problem is
they go to the shelf, and more often than not,
that shelf is empty. We don't have enough donated kidneys,
and so people that are dying, even though doctors know
how to fit you, they die because they just don't
have enough stuff. And that frustrated me. A little bit
(11:22):
that was odd. And then a few years later, I'm
walking down a mall. I'm living in New York with
my wife and at Valentine's Day week, and we said,
I got a good idea. You go down that way
and buy me a Valentine's Day present. I'll go down
this way and I'll buy you and we'll meet up
in an hour. So as we're walking down the mall,
I'm walking and it's New York. It's a very crowded mall.
I come upon a table set up in the middle
(11:44):
of the mall. It's an elderly couple, and I've hit closer.
I see a little handwritten sign on their table that said,
please help us save our daughter's life. And my immediate
reaction was, I don't want to be bummed out. I'm
here to buy up Valentine's they give. I walked by,
pretending like I didn't even notice they were there. And
after I walked by, I turned around casually and took
(12:06):
a look, and I noticed everybody else in this very
crowded mall was doing exactly the same thing. Go well,
walking right by him. That hurt me a little bit,
so I maybe you turn I'm kingling as I tell
you this. I went back and I said, what's up,
what's with your daughter? And they gave me a story
that their daughter had leukemia unrelated to kidneys, it's blood cancer.
(12:27):
They said they were asking their neighbors and people in
their community at the mall and they'd be willing to
go to their church that Sunday and give a test
tube of blood to see if they might be a
match for bone marrow for their daughter. Yeah, I went
their daughter there. Look, what do you do for family?
Anything you can. They're asking strangers for a just a
(12:49):
test tube of blood. So I found my wife and
instead of buying flowers and candy that Valentine's Day, sure enough,
that Sunday we went to that family's church. We rolled
up our sleeves and just a test tube of blood,
you know, just bunches. At the time, none of these
stories are are big deals. They were they you think
(13:12):
they would disappear. But somewhere in my knuckle head, I
had like a filing cabinet that must have been putting
these memories away. And eventually, when you know, I got
to the point where I raised my hand and I
called me in Washington, d C. As the headquarters of
the National Kidney Foundation, and I said, hey, I'm thinking
about donating. Can I done any kidney? And they sent me.
(13:33):
Within a week, they sent me a huge packet of
information about how to donate. But as I'm looking at it,
it's all how to donate after you're dead.
Speaker 3 (13:42):
Wow.
Speaker 4 (13:42):
I called him back and said, dude, I'm not dead yet.
I'm thinking about donating now. And oh, sorry, we must
have misunderstood. Is it for a family member or a friend?
And I said, well, actually, it's none of the above.
I'm thinking maybe whoever needs it the most. And that's
when they told me you can't do that. It's illegal.
So what all said and done? This psych I told
(14:04):
the psychiatrist. Remember I'm laying on a tape on a
bed in Washington, DC. At the end of this story,
I put my coat and I look at her. I'm
much what she was supposed to say. So I go,
how did I do? And she laughed a little bit
and said you did great. She said, now I'd like
to see you next Friday with your wife. So let
me tell you at this point in the story, my
(14:25):
wife knows absolutely nothing about this. So you know the
end of the story, but at the time I wasn't.
I didn't donate. I was literally just curious in asking questions.
So that day, that night I get home, my wife was,
how is your day, honey? I said, it's good. You know.
I had a hamburger for lunch. I had a meeting
with Bill. Oh guess what. I sat with a psychiatrist
(14:45):
in Washington and talked about maybe giving my kidney to
a stranger. And of course my wife starts laughing. She says,
you're so funny. I said, I know, but I actually
did this. Then she stopped laughing, and she says, well,
you're not serious, are you? I said, yeah, well, I'm
serious about getting the information. Now. It's only not only
not only is she not laughing, she's getting a little angry.
(15:06):
She just let me get this straight. You're telling me
that you want to risk your life and have surgery,
surgery that you might not wake up from, to give
your what are your body parts to a stranger? What
happens if your kidneys it down the road? What happens
if I need it down the road? I said, well,
be honest with you, if somebody needs it down the road,
And I don't have one. I'll find one. I'm pretty
(15:27):
comfortable in that, so she was. She was pretty perturbed
with me. And that night there was a TV show
on This is a This is twenty five thirty years ago.
It was a special. It was a documentary special about
Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. It was kind of like
a real life er. They were following around er doctors
and as we're watching, there was a story about a
(15:49):
little child, maybe an eight or nine year old little girl,
and you knew the child was going to die. It
was said. It was hard to watch, but you knew
they couldn't do anything to fix her. And so they
cut to a So I look at my wife and
of course she's crying and I look over, why are
you crying? Well, the little girl. They're trying to save her.
They couldn't save her. And then it hit me and
I looked at my wife and said, I think we
(16:12):
can do something just like that and save somebody that's
in the same boat. She looked at me and went, Okay,
I'll go to that PSYCHIATRISTO. It was I mean, it
was crazy and so ready for this. The next Friday,
we walk into the psychiatrist. I'm a pro at this point.
We walk in there and in the first five minutes,
(16:36):
this psychiatrist looks at my wife and says, you know,
in any surgery there's risk, there could be complications during surgery.
It might even leave your husband in a permanent vegetative state.
And if that were to happen, would you still be
able to take care of him for the rest of
his life? And I'm looking at this doctor going, really,
you're hitting her with the vegetable question right up front
(16:58):
here five minutes my wife, I love her. She looks
at the doctor and goes, look, I don't want to
do this. I'm not doing this, but I understand his
reasoning and why he wants to. Of course, I take
care of my love and he's my husband. Oh that
is so cool. So we walked out of that office.
It's in my scrapok, right now, I've got a letter
that says Harold is normal with a fancy little seal
(17:20):
on it. And after that then came all the tests.
Then they sent me back to the hospital and blood
tests pnn jars MRIs EKGs. You know, they had to
find out if I even have two kidneys. So as
we're going through this. I kept telling my wife, don't
worry about it. I learned that there were ten other
people trying to get through this experimental program, and they
(17:43):
had kicked out every single one of them for one
reason or another medical other, And so I said, you
know me, I don't take tests. Well, there's no way
I'm passing all these tests. Can't see the first person
in DC was the first to pass all these tests.
This guy me had to Yeah. So I said to
my wife, Okay, take a deep breath. They passed us.
(18:07):
You're fifty one percent of this vision. I'll be forty
nine percent. What do you think she's yeah, absolutely, I've
been with you. I've asked the questions. I know what's
at risk, and the chances are very good you're going
to wake up. Yeah, let's do this. So in December
of two thousand, I kissed her goodbye. They wheeled me
into an operating room and I remember, at this point,
I have no idea who's getting my kidney? Male, female, black, white, Asian, Hispanic.
(18:31):
The idea is you're not supposed to know, and it's
not supposed to care. It goes to whoever needs it
the most. So they knocked me out. I wake up.
It's like a blink of an eye. I don't know
if you've had surgery before, but anesthesia just crazy. It's
like I blinked my eyes and when I opened them,
not only was the surge over. I'm in my room.
My wife tells me when I woke up, I wasn't
(18:52):
you know, just a little woozy and everything. And the
first thing I said was how did everything go? She's, well,
you're great. Everything went fine. But we didn't know about
the recipient. So that night, I'm feeling good. There's all
kinds of drugs pumping through my body, and I'm feeling
good that we did a good thing. And the phone
rings and it's the woman in charge of this experimental program,
(19:12):
and she says, look, I'm not really allowed to tell
you anything about the recipient, but if you want, I
can share a few tidbits with you. I went sure, please.
I said, well, she's a wife. She's a woman. She's
an accountant in Springfield, Virginia. And as soon as they
put your kidney inside of her, it started keying up
a storm. And I went, is that good? And she
(19:35):
laughed and said yeah, no. It started functioning immediately when
they put it in her. I had a real good
night's sleep that night, my wife and I and I
was only in the hospital two days. They kicked me home.
You know. I went back to work about three weeks later.
When I go to the beach today, you can't see anything.
I don't have any eating restrictions. I haven't don't have
to eat any pills all I do. Not a single
(19:58):
day goes by where I don't think, oh man, Gannette.
I met my recipient three months after surgery. They held
a press conference, because I remember it was one of
the first in the country.
Speaker 3 (20:10):
Had first corn for a anonymous kidney donner.
Speaker 4 (20:15):
Yeah, so they wanted press, which makes sense because they
wanted other people maybe to raise their hand. So before
surgery was eyeing nervous, not one bit. We had asked
so many questions. But before I walked in that conference
room at the end of the hall, right, I know
there's press there. I know she and her family are
in there, I was kind of peeing in my pants
a little bit. So we're walking down the hall. The
door opens up, and the TV cameras and the flashbolts
(20:37):
from the newspapers. Click click, click, and all of a sudden,
I see this tiny black woman with a bouquet of flowers,
and I know that's gotta be her. So I walked
up to her and I get look, I'm six four,
I'm tall, she's not. She's barely five feet. And I
gave her a big hug. And for the next two
hours we sat down with each other and tried to
explain to each other that we end up in this
(21:00):
room together. And you know what I told her. I
told her he was exactly what I just told you.
And she and her husband emigrated from Ethiopia because of
her health. She was she's had kidney problems for for
years at that point, and the doctor told her in
Ethiopia that you'd have a better chance of getting a
(21:20):
kidney in the United States, so they came to the US. Meanwhile,
her help was consistently constantly declining, and eventually the doctor said, look,
we're not You've got You've got a week to go.
There's not much hope. But she says, don't worry. God
told me I was going to get a kidney by
the end of the year, he told me. And I'm
(21:42):
listening to this one, I'm shivering a little bit, because
this was December when I decided to do this, And
so when they called her one day and said, get
to the hospital, we've got your kidney. And when we
when we met, I'm telling you, I'm fo She's five,
but she's the most religious person. She's the most serious
(22:04):
Christian I've ever met. And I don't want lightning to
strike our broadcast here, but I ain't got a lot
of questions about what's going on up there. I really
am not sure. And she said that's okay, you don't
have to be sure. I'm sure I know. And where
I talk loud, I talk often. She barely talks about
a whisper. She and I are as opposite, as opposite
(22:27):
as two people can be, spiritually, physically, everything. And yet
today it's twenty years later, and I'm connected to her
as I'm connected to all my family. I tell you,
if people hear this, and it's a really good, happy
ever after story, if there ever was one. But at
(22:47):
the same time, I've met a lot of people since
then who have also donated their kidneys, many of them
to people that didn't know, And every time they share
their story with me, I don't know about you listening
to me, but I hear their story even though I
did it. I hear that and I look at them, go,
what's wrong with you? Who does that? That sounds so
crazy to do, but I did it. So I don't
(23:10):
even know how to come to terms with that. So
I know it's odd. I know it's a really good thing.
Not a day goes by, but I don't think about
it that she's, you know, at Springfield, still living her
life and kids and family and everything like that that
might not have happened had the doctors and I got
together and done this. So any opportunity I get, whether
(23:30):
it's talking to you or what I usually focus on
is classrooms of high school kids that are about to
get their driver's license. I don't want people to do
what I did. I think that's kind of crazy, but
something as simple as sunning your driver's license to say,
when I'm done with my parts, please take them, see
if you can do something with them and help somebody.
I can't see why any everybody wouldn't sign that piece
(23:52):
of paper. So I take every time I can, I
share my story and let people hear it, not to
get them to do what I did. She at least
to get them to consider it, to consider that there's
ways you can help people that won't adversally affect you
at all. So it's a good story.
Speaker 3 (24:10):
That is a great story, and I applaud you for
stepping up and going ahead and donating. I am the
one thing here is that what actually the question I had.
I'm listening to your story and it's very similar to
my wife's story. I'll be brief with her story because
there's another podcast to follow with hers, but this is
(24:30):
primarily yours. But I see some similarities. You were sure
you didn't know in the beginning, You got your questions answered,
verified and reinforce you saying hey, yeah, I'm ready to
do this. It's not a lot of people can make
that decision. And even my wife, just like you talked
to your wife, she came to me and said, hey,
(24:54):
I want to donate my kidney to my father. I
was like, if God told you to do it, and
that's what you want to do, do it, That's all
I said. I said, because I understand in my backstory, HEROD,
is that you know I serve. I served my country
for twelve years in the United States Marine Corps. I've
(25:16):
traveled the world. I've seen so many different places. I've
seen people deprived and where they live wanting better. I've
seen people in the worst health conditions around the world.
I've been in and had my share of health episodes,
And just sitting there thinking about, well, man, how did
I feel when I wanted to get better? When I
(25:37):
had an opportunity to get better, I took it. So
why I looked at her and said, first of all,
your father helped bring you into this world. If you
that's something you want to do, do, who am I
to tell you you cannot? I have no place to
even say that or be selfish about it.
Speaker 4 (25:56):
So with that, weren't you? Weren't you may not wake
her from that surgery?
Speaker 3 (26:02):
I was. I was scared to death. But you know,
I'm a believer. I believe in God, and I also
believe that things happened for a reason, and I had
to accept that. And another thing that I thought about too,
when I left and traveled around the world during the
war and my mom would call me and she'd be
(26:23):
worried about me. I thought back back when I had
got enlisted in the Marine Corps and she knew I
was traveling and I told my mom on the phone,
don't worry about me. I'm doing what I love to do.
If anything happened to me, no I did. I made
up my mind to do it. It wasn't you, and
I'm happy and I decided to do it. And that
brought her comfort.
Speaker 4 (26:44):
So I figured much comfort is when you as when
you came home safe and sense.
Speaker 3 (26:50):
Sure, sure that was the ultimate comfort. But I think
she understood and she got it. So when my wife
told me, I got it, you know what I mean,
I knew that your mission, that's what you have to do.
But yeah, those are the similarities and and and in
you doing that, man, I just like you said, I'm
(27:10):
sitting here listening to the story. I did not want
to interrupt you. I did not want to ask any
questions because anybody that's listening to this, I wanted to
get the full scope of what you wanted to say
without interruption, to get it out.
Speaker 4 (27:23):
Well. Thanks, thanks, you know, it's uh, it's it's I
don't know how people react on the hearth. I just
think how i'd react, and I still shake my head, going,
that's just an odd thing for somebody to do. But
it didn't seem odd for me when I was asking
the questions before I actually donated, and I was asking
the questions, I remember after I had finished all the tests,
(27:45):
I had to sit around and wait for about three
months for somebody to tell me you've been a proof. Remember,
nobody had done it yet. And every every week that
goes by, how come I haven't heard from them? How
come I haven't heard from them? So one day I
called up the donation center a tory son and go,
how come we haven't heard Well, look, you got to
understand the doctors. They're questioning your mental status. They want
(28:05):
to make sure they're the hippocratic oath says first, do
no harm, don't take a healthy patient and risk his life.
That there's a lot of medical questions there. And my
response probably was rude. Was you know, while they're having
that conversation, there's fifteen people die in every day. I
don't think they care. If I'm willing to do it,
they should at least consider it. Well, So it took
(28:28):
the few months, but eventually, yeah, full speed ahead. And
since then I've met you find this interesting? Maybe I've
met a lot of other folks who ended up donating
to people they don't know since then, and I find
it very interesting. Here's some facts. Most of the people
I've met that have done this are female. Most of
them are heavily believers in God. Most of them I've asked,
(28:53):
are you a risk taker? And they go, what do
you mean? I said, have you ever been skydiving or
bungee jumping? About out of four of them say yes.
They laugh and say yes. So I've kind of started
collecting this. What does somebody who donates look like? Are
you a blood donor? Yes, I've been giving blood my
whole life, so that means that tells me if you
(29:16):
give blood regularly, doesn't mean you're going to give a
kidney away, But if you give a kidney away, there's
a serious chance. Or a regular blood donor, so all
these things that kind of put us in a in
a list or a column. If you're a female, if
you're a believer in God, if you're a blood donor,
of all these things doesn't mean you will, but you could.
Speaker 3 (29:36):
And so yeah, probability very interesting.
Speaker 4 (29:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (29:40):
Now I want to let our listeners know too, because
you have a website it's called do Hey, dude, where's
my kidney? I love you. I love that long. No,
I love it.
Speaker 4 (29:53):
It's like, yes, where's my kidney?
Speaker 3 (29:56):
Where's my car?
Speaker 4 (29:57):
Right?
Speaker 3 (29:57):
Where's my kidney?
Speaker 4 (29:59):
Uh? In a documentary on that website.
Speaker 3 (30:02):
That I watched, Yeah, I watched it, and I love
the way. The other name that comes up to is
one eight hundred give us your kidney dot com. I
noticed that when when I was watching the stories, I
can see that you were on a flight, you are
watching the movie, and then, like you said, what sparked
this was at the end of the film you saw, huh,
(30:23):
donate your kidney, give us your kidney, and that sparked
the interest of what now is you pioneering just by
asking the question for kidney donation? This movie, this film
has been voted best Filmy waymea Ocean Film Festival, Washington
(30:44):
West Naple Valley Film Festival, Twin Cities Film Festival, and
also win Good Humanitarian Film Festival, all the all of
recent in the last ten years. So this is a
questioning the.
Speaker 4 (30:59):
Reason why that film was popular. As people go see
documentary films and usually it's about oh my god, there's
so many plastic particles in the ocean. Oh my god,
this is happening this is terrible. Look, this is not
one of those hurts you stories. This is a happy
way of rafter story. Yeah, it is seeing a movie
like that that when you walk out you feel uplifted,
(31:20):
You feel better about yourself, you feel better about mankind. Yeah,
so it touched a lot of people on and then
I'm you know, my story, My story is the more
people that hear it, see it, touch it, taste it.
Maybe they'll raise your hand one day, maybe not to
do what I did, but maybe they hear a friend needs,
or a coworker needs, or a boss needs. Maybe it
won't be so odd. Maybe the least they won't say yes,
(31:43):
but start asking the questions. Because when you ask questions,
brace yourself. You might get answers that you're okay with them.
Speaker 3 (31:50):
And I'll hear it actually has You have some links
where you're going to you want to become a donor.
You can click on their and get some more insight
on that. And from what I understand, you also have
you're hitting up. You have a chapter in Los Angeles?
Is that great?
Speaker 4 (32:05):
Yeah? Los Angeles is a large city, right, And so
about three and twenty twenty we post it note online
that said, hey, are you an organ donor, specifically a
kidney donor. So we're getting together for a lunch at
this restaurant this time, had no idea how many people
at show up, but about twenty five people showed. I
was shocked. I didn't know that. And since then people
(32:28):
keep reaching out. There's probably one hundred and fifty members
right now, and we all try to share with each other.
How are you promoting? How are you if you were
promoting at all? If we try to provide audiences for
people that might want to hear you, believe it or not.
You know, there's lots of groups that would love to
have people hear you speak about organ donation. Yeah, it's
(32:49):
silch it again, it's odd for lots of people. So
they're all over the country. I know Valerie has got
you know, hers in your neighborhood. There's probably about sixty
or seventy one kidney clubs all over the.
Speaker 3 (33:02):
One Kidney Club yep. So this is the one kidney
Club La that you actually chapter. And then she started
the one Kidney Club Las Vegas. And that's how because
of course you two have something in common, and of
course you guys pass information back to each other and
near each other's mentor so for those that want to
get involved, you can if you just like Herold was saying,
(33:25):
if you're interested, want to answer some questions, He's available
in La here in Las Vegas. There it's information. Corporations
are actually requesting for you to come and speak to
their folks as well. Was that great?
Speaker 4 (33:40):
Absolutely, there's no there's no wrong way to do this.
I've had meetings with Alliance Club, you know, called me
up on So I got to the Chinese restaurant where
they're having me. It's four dudes over the age of
seventy and I'm thinking they don't want to donate. They're
an age where they might need something soon. But every
opportunity I have to share the story, it all works out.
(34:03):
It all works out the way it's supposed to work out,
so large groups, small groups, it's just a good story
to share. And usually I'd like to think, even though
I don't know the ends of the story, that's a
continuing story. But I like to think when I go
to bed at night, somebody that I spoke to that
I don't know that maybe it was ten years ago
they have raised their hand and said i'd like to
(34:25):
do that, and so the ripples just keep going as
long as you keep throwing stones in the river.
Speaker 3 (34:30):
Now, one thing I found interesting is the director producer
of the film Samantha Smith. He's born and raised in
Las Vegas. What yeah is it?
Speaker 4 (34:41):
See my friend of mine? When I tell him I
got a lot of questions about the big G upstairs,
he goes, well, I said, it's just too much of
a coincident. He goes, coincidence is how do you think
these things happen? It's not a coincidence. These things are
chosen to happen. I have questions. I have questions about
that too, But Vegas. Yeah, she's a serious filmmaker and
(35:06):
I don't know how she ended up choosing this story,
but I'm thrilled she did.
Speaker 3 (35:10):
Yes, I'm thrilled too. And if you guys need Harold
to come speak, if you go to the website once again,
do Where's my kidney dot com, you can actually request
him to come to you or to talk on podcasts
like this or anywhere, and he's available to actually share
his heartfelt experience.
Speaker 4 (35:32):
As a Samantha director. And if you want doctors, I've
got contacts with lots of people if you want somebody
in your neighborhood that didn't let me know, I can
find another Herald in your backyard. Probably that I'm working
more than happy chat.
Speaker 3 (35:45):
And I would definitely love for you to do that
for me if you can. So we're doing our part here,
especially with you and your story and my wife and
her story for the kidney donation. We want to make
sure we keep this going and bring awareness. We actually
have a family friend right now, our close friend, who
is going through the same thing and needing a kidney.
He's been on the list for the past year and
a half, so we are praying for him to in
(36:08):
family you know as well. So we're trying to get
him his information that he needs and he's looking for
mentors as well. Now going through all of this, as
we start to wrap up the conversation, I want to
ask you know, I'm a DJ Herald, So with any
(36:29):
mood or anything that you were going through, be it life,
kidney donation, pondering thoughts, need to be in a good
spirit or you're kind of not in a good place
today but you need something to uplift you. What do
you play like? Music sues the soul right as one
of the universal languages that we have here on this earth.
(36:49):
But what do you what do you frequently listen to
in your playlist?
Speaker 4 (36:54):
Don't laugh at me, but I know on my iPhone
it tells me what my most often played artists and
songs are. I won't edit it, but don't laugh at me.
Speaker 3 (37:06):
I won't.
Speaker 4 (37:07):
You're top five and they're not in any order, but
it's five on the list. Bob Dylan, Okay, yeah, I
like Jimmy Cliff. Uh. Let's see, it's a little feet
uh believe it or not. A small group that nobody's
(37:28):
ever heard of. Robin Thompson Band, they're a Virginia band
that was around in the eighties. And led Zeppelin because
it's led Zeppelin.
Speaker 3 (37:36):
This led Zeppelin.
Speaker 4 (37:37):
Now I'm curious about between them in concerts.
Speaker 3 (37:40):
So what's what is the uh for our listeners? So
if they want to look them up? And then that's why
I asked. I love, I love when our guests introduced
new groups to us, because hey, we brought not Horizon.
So what what genre would that be in? Or are
they spread out across several different ones?
Speaker 4 (37:57):
Oh my gosh, yeah, Bob Dylan. Usually it's a early stuff,
which is an acoustic. You got the other end of
the spectrum, the Zeppelin, which is not a hard rock,
but I'll call it hard rock for me. Jimmy clip
is reggae. So these it's like spinning you know, a dial,
and it's hitting opposites. But I love that. It's like
my book reading. I read fiction, I read nonfiction, I
(38:17):
read history. So there's no rule to music. It's whatever
it makes you feel good, so it's all over the map.
Speaker 3 (38:23):
I love that exactly exactly. I feel the same way,
Harold Man. I enjoyed a conversation. I appreciate you, sir
for making yourself available. Is there anything that you would
like to tell our listeners here at the grind of
where we can find you, or any last nuggets that
you want to give anybody that's contemplating or have a
(38:45):
family member that's going through this, what would you like
to tell them before we close out the podcast tonight.
Speaker 4 (38:53):
Yeah, that's a good question. Thanks for asking. So if
you're family member or some of you know that you're
close with is in need, oftentimes what happens is the
person in need can't ask, it's too uncomfortable, so they
get something like an advocate. Sometimes it's a friend, sometimes
it's a family member. And I'm telling you it's organize
(39:16):
a question and answer or ask friends, maybe ten friends.
They get together your house for coffee one Saturday afternoon
and bring in somebody who's done this before. Not to
convince them to donate, but to answer questions and to
share that it's not something so crazy that you might
think it is. Don't ask them to donate, don't ask
them to sign these piece of paper. Just give them
(39:37):
the information and if you want to talk about a
little bit more, you can contact me at Dude, Where's
mykidney dot com and I'll hook you up with people
in your area that are really stellar, people that are
good at this. And again I'm telling you they're not
trying to push people that do anything. It's just information exchange,
and I think that's where the key to this starts.
(39:58):
Asking questions and then any answers.
Speaker 3 (40:01):
Now, you definitely know before we get out here. You
know we're going to have to show up in Los
Angeles so we can actually meet up and sit down
and meet in person when we have a chance, So
please forward to that.
Speaker 4 (40:12):
Yes, I'm very lucky. My wife and I live in Malibu, California.
And before you get all too fancy on me, I
live in a trailer park in Malibu. But it's a
Malibu trailer park. There's wine racks and Viking rangers and everything,
but it's a double wide. You come to LA, I'm
your host. I got you in, no problem.
Speaker 3 (40:29):
Well, we look forward to it, and listeners, please make
sure you check out the information that has been provided
to you, and thank you for listening, Thanks for coming
back and joining us, and we'll see you once again.
Speaker 1 (40:42):
Hey guys, and welcome to the grind E magazine, your
ground zero for all things Jade and v events and
DJ retro. If staying in the note about the hottest
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(41:04):
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(41:26):
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Grind to get your business, your brand in front of
our savvy, plugged in audience
Not any way you can.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
How many you'll give it a night?
Speaker 3 (00:05):
So I'm both to go on, so full away, Lady.
Speaker 4 (00:12):
Lendygo.
Speaker 1 (00:16):
Hello everyone. My name is Valerie Perier and I'm the
founder of the One Kidney Club, Las Vegas, Nevada. You
can find us on Facebook at one Kidney Club Las Vegas,
Nevada or Instagram. Our Instagram handle is one Kidney Club
lv N. Our email address is One Kidney Club LVN
at gmail dot com. If you would like to learn
more information on how you can become a living kidney donor,
(00:38):
please visit the National Kidney Registry at Kidney Registry dot com.
Speaker 5 (00:46):
Here we are another episode of The Grind.
Speaker 3 (00:50):
Thanks for joining us, King, I'm your host, James Perrier.
Speaker 5 (00:54):
This podcast is going to take us on the trip, trips.
Speaker 3 (00:58):
And places and moments of my life where I discovered
hip hop artists and you.
Speaker 5 (01:04):
All ready to go, Let's hit it life live. I
got your fier soon this Perrier press play.
Speaker 2 (01:23):
The Grind starts, the rhyme starts.
Speaker 5 (01:25):
We come together like car parks to make you move. Y'alls,
are life gonna help you out on this little bit.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
Ruis the preface to enlighten you with all we do
flaws exposure you. If you selp can get Jim poster
to poster, we poster help.
Speaker 5 (01:38):
Each other out, no doubt for disclosure.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
Get tuned into the Grind. It's time we take it
over and it's it's life.
Speaker 5 (01:44):
On your line.
Speaker 3 (01:45):
The guests of the Grind, welcome back to another podcast
here with your host DJ Retro. Here at the Grind
and you can find us at the grind dot online.
I have to tell you this evening, I have a
guest with us that's gonna share his phenomenonal story about donation.
(02:07):
And you might be some things might be going through
your mind right now saying, hey, what kind of donation
you know? Clothing? Or is it food or is it whatnot?
And those are the things that we actually think about
when we hear that word, sometimes a church. But man,
this story is awesome. Introduced to me by my wife
who has donated and they have this in common. But
(02:29):
we're gonna get right into the podcast. We're going to
respect his time. He's really busy tonight, but I like
to introduce you to a very special guest, mister Harold Mints.
How are you doing tonight, Harold?
Speaker 4 (02:43):
I'm doing great. I'm doing better now that I'm chatting
with you.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
Thanks so much, no problem. Once again, i'd like to
say thank you. I know you're busy and you made time,
and with the time difference, we got it to work.
But tonight it's not about me or the show is
actually about you because you have a captivating story of donations.
So at this time I'm going back off and let
(03:07):
you introduce yourself and let the listeners know why you
are here, why you accepted our invite to be on
a show tonight.
Speaker 4 (03:14):
Well, absolutely, so let me break the rules of storytelling
and go straight to the last chapter. So right back
in the year twenty about twenty four years or so ago,
I found myself in a hospital at Georgetown University in Washington, DC,
where a team of transplant surgeons wheeled me into an
(03:36):
operating room. They knocked me out, they cut me open,
They took out my left kidney. They put it in
beer cooler filled with ice. Somebody put that beer clue
in the back of their car, drove across town to
a different hospital where a different team of transplant surgeons
took my kidney and put it inside of someone I
(03:58):
didn't know, and it never met before for and so
as odd as that may be for me, at least
it was the natural progression of a line of thought
that had started a couple years before. So I ended
up being one of the first people in the country
who raised their hand and said, hey, I got an
(04:18):
extra one. Get this whoever needs it the most. And
I got to tell you, when I first said that
to the medical community in the Washington, DC area, I
was shocked at the responses. You know what they told
me the first time, you can't do that. It's illegal.
I mean, I go, I mean, I said, well, have
you ever heard of something called the waiting list? I
(04:40):
said yeah, And they said, well, it's run by the
federal government and if you needed a heart or a lung,
or a kid near whatever organ you might be in
need of, that the knee goes to the federal government
and they go to their list and they keep this
running list. That's how old you are, how sick you are,
how long you've been on the waiting list, and based
(05:01):
upon a bunch of factors, it kind of sees you
you're number one, you're number two, etc. And they said
to me, you said you wanted to give your kidney
to somebody who needs it the most in Washington, d C.
And they said, well, what happens if somebody in Wilmington, Delaware?
Is next time the list and you said you want
to give it to somebody in DC. It's like the
protocols that the government set up. And so sorry, mister Mints,
(05:24):
you can't do that today. But at the end of
the call kind of made me laugh a little, but
they said, but if he give us your name and
contact information, if anything ever changes, will call you. In
my head, I'm thinking, yeah, sure you will. Guess what.
Two years later, my phone rings and I go and
I go, hey, is the Harald Mintz who said he
wanted to give his kidney away? And I said, whoa
(05:47):
slow down. I didn't say I want to do it.
I said I was curious and I had questions and
I was considering doing it. And they said, well, guess what.
The very first program in the country that allows people
to donate the people they don't know has just been established,
and it happens to be in the Washington, DC area,
and if you want, you can come in and ask questions.
(06:10):
And I remember going, wow, okay, So I wrote a
book it's in my scrapp Now. I wrote up about
a dozen questions. So let me ask you something. Let's
say you're getting ready to have surgery next week to
give your kidney away. What do you want to ask
the doctors? What are some of the questions you want
to ask?
Speaker 3 (06:28):
Wow, I think one of the questions is what's the
impact of my health after I donate a kidney?
Speaker 5 (06:36):
Yeah, that's a little shit question, right.
Speaker 4 (06:38):
Yeah, you know that's on my listics. Here's how I
asked it. What are the chances I'm not waking up
from that surgery? You know what's going to happen? And
actually they told me if it's not emergency, if it's
planned out at a time. At the time, they told
me it was about one in three thousand people might
not wake up from that surgery. And I'm thinking, well,
that's no problem. Today I think, well that's not nothing.
(07:02):
But at the time I thought that's no problem. And
I said, I like fried food. I like you know,
fried fish, fried chicken, and all kinds of stuff. Can
I still do that? And they said, well, your heart
won't love you if you keep you know, eating fry food.
But your kidney no problem. Okay, I'm not a heavy drinker,
but every once in a while I'll have a glass
of wine or a beer. Is that okay? They went, Yeah,
(07:25):
your liver won't love you too much if you overdo
that over too much. But again, your kidneyat no problem. Okay,
how about this one. I'm going to go to the
beach next summer. If I'm walking on the beach, our
people are going to look at me and freak out,
like I'm Frankenstein. Am I going to be scarred up?
They say, no, Actually, there's this new way we do
these surgeries and most people won't even notice it. So
(07:46):
I went through all these questions and nothing they said
to me freak me out. I'm like, okay, what do
we do next? What do you think? The very first
medical test that they asked me to.
Speaker 3 (07:57):
Do was I'm gonna ask you and say, hey, did
ask you to a DNA test or match test?
Speaker 4 (08:06):
You know? It's interest. That's a really interesting question that
came later on. The very first test wasn't he in
a jar? Which I had to do a million times?
It wasn't give blood? You're ready for this. The very
first medical thing was they sent me to a psychiatrist,
which made me laugh, like what kind of knucklehead wakes
up in the morning and says, you know what I'm
(08:26):
gonna do today, I'm gonna start giving up body parts
to strangers. It's like nobody does that, And so I said,
I'm happy to do that. So about a week or
so later, I go to this psychiatrist's office and the
first thing she says to me is whould you like
to sit in the chair or should like to lay
down on this couch? And I'm already thinking, gee, she's
judging me if I choose one versus the other. And
(08:48):
so they sat out in the chair and I spent
about half an hour with her, and she wanted to
find out what my motivation was. And you know, that's
a good question, because today I couldn't even tell you
what makes somebody want to do this? But I said, well,
ever since high school. You know, I gave blood when
I was in high school, not because I'm a nice guy,
not because I want to donate anything. But I got
(09:11):
to class and the teacher said, we're having an assembly today.
You can either stay in class and take a quiz
or you can go to the assembly. Whoa that's an
easy one. I don't want to take a quiz. I'm
going to go to the assembly. Like the rest of
the class. We walk down. Normally, the assemblies are a
gym or an auditorium. This particular assembly was in the cafeteria,
(09:32):
and I'm like, that's odd. I walk in there and
the first thing I see is a bunch of my
classmates and they're laying down on let's call them cots
or pits. They had needles on their arm and they're
giving blood. I'm like, wait a minute, this isn't an assembly.
This is poking, needles and blood donation. And the teacher said, well, look,
you don't have to do it, but you go back
(09:54):
and take the quiz. So, for the first time in
my life, I rolled up my sleeve. I gave a
pine of blo blood. And after I gave a pint
of blood, the captain of the cheerleaders gave me a cookie,
and I'm like, wow, I get to lay down, I
don't have to take any quizzes, and the captain of
the cheerleaders has given me baked goods. I'll give blood
every day if they asked me too. This was a
(10:15):
good thing for me. And so from there. So I
shared that with her and she said, well, okay, any
other levers in your life that led you this way?
And I went through a few, so I'll do it
really quickly with him. My father passed a long time
ago that he was like fifty five, who was young,
and they couldn't fix what it was. It wasn't money
(10:37):
that killed him. It wasn't that way, he didn't have
enough money. It was the doctors knew exactly what to
do to fix them, they just didn't have enough parts
on the shelf. For example, if somebody right now, why
you and I are having this conversation, fifteen to twenty
people die in the US every day because they're waiting
for a kidney. The doctors know exactly what to do
(11:00):
to fix these people. You go to the shelf, you
take a kidney that matches your blood type and everything,
and they put it in you. But the problem is
they go to the shelf, and more often than not,
that shelf is empty. We don't have enough donated kidneys,
and so people that are dying, even though doctors know
how to fit you, they die because they just don't
have enough stuff. And that frustrated me. A little bit
(11:22):
that was odd. And then a few years later, I'm
walking down a mall. I'm living in New York with
my wife and at Valentine's Day week, and we said,
I got a good idea. You go down that way
and buy me a Valentine's Day present. I'll go down
this way and I'll buy you and we'll meet up
in an hour. So as we're walking down the mall,
I'm walking and it's New York. It's a very crowded mall.
I come upon a table set up in the middle
(11:44):
of the mall. It's an elderly couple, and I've hit closer.
I see a little handwritten sign on their table that said,
please help us save our daughter's life. And my immediate
reaction was, I don't want to be bummed out. I'm
here to buy up Valentine's they give. I walked by,
pretending like I didn't even notice they were there. And
after I walked by, I turned around casually and took
(12:06):
a look, and I noticed everybody else in this very
crowded mall was doing exactly the same thing. Go well,
walking right by him. That hurt me a little bit,
so I maybe you turn I'm kingling as I tell
you this. I went back and I said, what's up,
what's with your daughter? And they gave me a story
that their daughter had leukemia unrelated to kidneys, it's blood cancer.
(12:27):
They said they were asking their neighbors and people in
their community at the mall and they'd be willing to
go to their church that Sunday and give a test
tube of blood to see if they might be a
match for bone marrow for their daughter. Yeah, I went
their daughter there. Look, what do you do for family?
Anything you can. They're asking strangers for a just a
(12:49):
test tube of blood. So I found my wife and
instead of buying flowers and candy that Valentine's Day, sure enough,
that Sunday we went to that family's church. We rolled
up our sleeves and just a test tube of blood,
you know, just bunches. At the time, none of these
stories are are big deals. They were they you think
(13:12):
they would disappear. But somewhere in my knuckle head, I
had like a filing cabinet that must have been putting
these memories away. And eventually, when you know, I got
to the point where I raised my hand and I
called me in Washington, d C. As the headquarters of
the National Kidney Foundation, and I said, hey, I'm thinking
about donating. Can I done any kidney? And they sent me.
(13:33):
Within a week, they sent me a huge packet of
information about how to donate. But as I'm looking at it,
it's all how to donate after you're dead.
Speaker 3 (13:42):
Wow.
Speaker 4 (13:42):
I called him back and said, dude, I'm not dead yet.
I'm thinking about donating now. And oh, sorry, we must
have misunderstood. Is it for a family member or a friend?
And I said, well, actually, it's none of the above.
I'm thinking maybe whoever needs it the most. And that's
when they told me you can't do that. It's illegal.
So what all said and done? This psych I told
(14:04):
the psychiatrist. Remember I'm laying on a tape on a
bed in Washington, DC. At the end of this story,
I put my coat and I look at her. I'm
much what she was supposed to say. So I go,
how did I do? And she laughed a little bit
and said you did great. She said, now I'd like
to see you next Friday with your wife. So let
me tell you at this point in the story, my
(14:25):
wife knows absolutely nothing about this. So you know the
end of the story, but at the time I wasn't.
I didn't donate. I was literally just curious in asking questions.
So that day, that night I get home, my wife was,
how is your day, honey? I said, it's good. You know.
I had a hamburger for lunch. I had a meeting
with Bill. Oh guess what. I sat with a psychiatrist
(14:45):
in Washington and talked about maybe giving my kidney to
a stranger. And of course my wife starts laughing. She says,
you're so funny. I said, I know, but I actually
did this. Then she stopped laughing, and she says, well,
you're not serious, are you? I said, yeah, well, I'm
serious about getting the information. Now. It's only not only
not only is she not laughing, she's getting a little angry.
(15:06):
She just let me get this straight. You're telling me
that you want to risk your life and have surgery,
surgery that you might not wake up from, to give
your what are your body parts to a stranger? What
happens if your kidneys it down the road? What happens
if I need it down the road? I said, well,
be honest with you, if somebody needs it down the road,
And I don't have one. I'll find one. I'm pretty
(15:27):
comfortable in that, so she was. She was pretty perturbed
with me. And that night there was a TV show
on This is a This is twenty five thirty years ago.
It was a special. It was a documentary special about
Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. It was kind of like
a real life er. They were following around er doctors
and as we're watching, there was a story about a
(15:49):
little child, maybe an eight or nine year old little girl,
and you knew the child was going to die. It
was said. It was hard to watch, but you knew
they couldn't do anything to fix her. And so they
cut to a So I look at my wife and
of course she's crying and I look over, why are
you crying? Well, the little girl. They're trying to save her.
They couldn't save her. And then it hit me and
I looked at my wife and said, I think we
(16:12):
can do something just like that and save somebody that's
in the same boat. She looked at me and went, Okay,
I'll go to that PSYCHIATRISTO. It was I mean, it
was crazy and so ready for this. The next Friday,
we walk into the psychiatrist. I'm a pro at this point.
We walk in there and in the first five minutes,
(16:36):
this psychiatrist looks at my wife and says, you know,
in any surgery there's risk, there could be complications during surgery.
It might even leave your husband in a permanent vegetative state.
And if that were to happen, would you still be
able to take care of him for the rest of
his life? And I'm looking at this doctor going, really,
you're hitting her with the vegetable question right up front
(16:58):
here five minutes my wife, I love her. She looks
at the doctor and goes, look, I don't want to
do this. I'm not doing this, but I understand his
reasoning and why he wants to. Of course, I take
care of my love and he's my husband. Oh that
is so cool. So we walked out of that office.
It's in my scrapok, right now, I've got a letter
that says Harold is normal with a fancy little seal
(17:20):
on it. And after that then came all the tests.
Then they sent me back to the hospital and blood
tests pnn jars MRIs EKGs. You know, they had to
find out if I even have two kidneys. So as
we're going through this. I kept telling my wife, don't
worry about it. I learned that there were ten other
people trying to get through this experimental program, and they
(17:43):
had kicked out every single one of them for one
reason or another medical other, And so I said, you
know me, I don't take tests. Well, there's no way
I'm passing all these tests. Can't see the first person
in DC was the first to pass all these tests.
This guy me had to Yeah. So I said to
my wife, Okay, take a deep breath. They passed us.
(18:07):
You're fifty one percent of this vision. I'll be forty
nine percent. What do you think she's yeah, absolutely, I've
been with you. I've asked the questions. I know what's
at risk, and the chances are very good you're going
to wake up. Yeah, let's do this. So in December
of two thousand, I kissed her goodbye. They wheeled me
into an operating room and I remember, at this point,
I have no idea who's getting my kidney? Male, female, black, white, Asian, Hispanic.
(18:31):
The idea is you're not supposed to know, and it's
not supposed to care. It goes to whoever needs it
the most. So they knocked me out. I wake up.
It's like a blink of an eye. I don't know
if you've had surgery before, but anesthesia just crazy. It's
like I blinked my eyes and when I opened them,
not only was the surge over. I'm in my room.
My wife tells me when I woke up, I wasn't
(18:52):
you know, just a little woozy and everything. And the
first thing I said was how did everything go? She's, well,
you're great. Everything went fine. But we didn't know about
the recipient. So that night, I'm feeling good. There's all
kinds of drugs pumping through my body, and I'm feeling
good that we did a good thing. And the phone
rings and it's the woman in charge of this experimental program,
(19:12):
and she says, look, I'm not really allowed to tell
you anything about the recipient, but if you want, I
can share a few tidbits with you. I went sure, please.
I said, well, she's a wife. She's a woman. She's
an accountant in Springfield, Virginia. And as soon as they
put your kidney inside of her, it started keying up
a storm. And I went, is that good? And she
(19:35):
laughed and said yeah, no. It started functioning immediately when
they put it in her. I had a real good
night's sleep that night, my wife and I and I
was only in the hospital two days. They kicked me home.
You know. I went back to work about three weeks later.
When I go to the beach today, you can't see anything.
I don't have any eating restrictions. I haven't don't have
to eat any pills all I do. Not a single
(19:58):
day goes by where I don't think, oh man, Gannette.
I met my recipient three months after surgery. They held
a press conference, because I remember it was one of
the first in the country.
Speaker 3 (20:10):
Had first corn for a anonymous kidney donner.
Speaker 4 (20:15):
Yeah, so they wanted press, which makes sense because they
wanted other people maybe to raise their hand. So before
surgery was eyeing nervous, not one bit. We had asked
so many questions. But before I walked in that conference
room at the end of the hall, right, I know
there's press there. I know she and her family are
in there, I was kind of peeing in my pants
a little bit. So we're walking down the hall. The
door opens up, and the TV cameras and the flashbolts
(20:37):
from the newspapers. Click click, click, and all of a sudden,
I see this tiny black woman with a bouquet of flowers,
and I know that's gotta be her. So I walked
up to her and I get look, I'm six four,
I'm tall, she's not. She's barely five feet. And I
gave her a big hug. And for the next two
hours we sat down with each other and tried to
explain to each other that we end up in this
(21:00):
room together. And you know what I told her. I
told her he was exactly what I just told you.
And she and her husband emigrated from Ethiopia because of
her health. She was she's had kidney problems for for
years at that point, and the doctor told her in
Ethiopia that you'd have a better chance of getting a
(21:20):
kidney in the United States, so they came to the US. Meanwhile,
her help was consistently constantly declining, and eventually the doctor said, look,
we're not You've got You've got a week to go.
There's not much hope. But she says, don't worry. God
told me I was going to get a kidney by
the end of the year, he told me. And I'm
(21:42):
listening to this one, I'm shivering a little bit, because
this was December when I decided to do this, And
so when they called her one day and said, get
to the hospital, we've got your kidney. And when we
when we met, I'm telling you, I'm fo She's five,
but she's the most religious person. She's the most serious
(22:04):
Christian I've ever met. And I don't want lightning to
strike our broadcast here, but I ain't got a lot
of questions about what's going on up there. I really
am not sure. And she said that's okay, you don't
have to be sure. I'm sure I know. And where
I talk loud, I talk often. She barely talks about
a whisper. She and I are as opposite, as opposite
(22:27):
as two people can be, spiritually, physically, everything. And yet
today it's twenty years later, and I'm connected to her
as I'm connected to all my family. I tell you,
if people hear this, and it's a really good, happy
ever after story, if there ever was one. But at
(22:47):
the same time, I've met a lot of people since
then who have also donated their kidneys, many of them
to people that didn't know, And every time they share
their story with me, I don't know about you listening
to me, but I hear their story even though I
did it. I hear that and I look at them, go,
what's wrong with you? Who does that? That sounds so
crazy to do, but I did it. So I don't
(23:10):
even know how to come to terms with that. So
I know it's odd. I know it's a really good thing.
Not a day goes by, but I don't think about
it that she's, you know, at Springfield, still living her
life and kids and family and everything like that that
might not have happened had the doctors and I got
together and done this. So any opportunity I get, whether
(23:30):
it's talking to you or what I usually focus on
is classrooms of high school kids that are about to
get their driver's license. I don't want people to do
what I did. I think that's kind of crazy, but
something as simple as sunning your driver's license to say,
when I'm done with my parts, please take them, see
if you can do something with them and help somebody.
I can't see why any everybody wouldn't sign that piece
(23:52):
of paper. So I take every time I can, I
share my story and let people hear it, not to
get them to do what I did. She at least
to get them to consider it, to consider that there's
ways you can help people that won't adversally affect you
at all. So it's a good story.
Speaker 3 (24:10):
That is a great story, and I applaud you for
stepping up and going ahead and donating. I am the
one thing here is that what actually the question I had.
I'm listening to your story and it's very similar to
my wife's story. I'll be brief with her story because
there's another podcast to follow with hers, but this is
(24:30):
primarily yours. But I see some similarities. You were sure
you didn't know in the beginning, You got your questions answered,
verified and reinforce you saying hey, yeah, I'm ready to
do this. It's not a lot of people can make
that decision. And even my wife, just like you talked
to your wife, she came to me and said, hey,
(24:54):
I want to donate my kidney to my father. I
was like, if God told you to do it, and
that's what you want to do, do it, That's all
I said. I said, because I understand in my backstory, HEROD,
is that you know I serve. I served my country
for twelve years in the United States Marine Corps. I've
(25:16):
traveled the world. I've seen so many different places. I've
seen people deprived and where they live wanting better. I've
seen people in the worst health conditions around the world.
I've been in and had my share of health episodes,
And just sitting there thinking about, well, man, how did
I feel when I wanted to get better? When I
(25:37):
had an opportunity to get better, I took it. So
why I looked at her and said, first of all,
your father helped bring you into this world. If you
that's something you want to do, do, who am I
to tell you you cannot? I have no place to
even say that or be selfish about it.
Speaker 4 (25:56):
So with that, weren't you? Weren't you may not wake
her from that surgery?
Speaker 3 (26:02):
I was. I was scared to death. But you know,
I'm a believer. I believe in God, and I also
believe that things happened for a reason, and I had
to accept that. And another thing that I thought about too,
when I left and traveled around the world during the
war and my mom would call me and she'd be
(26:23):
worried about me. I thought back back when I had
got enlisted in the Marine Corps and she knew I
was traveling and I told my mom on the phone,
don't worry about me. I'm doing what I love to do.
If anything happened to me, no I did. I made
up my mind to do it. It wasn't you, and
I'm happy and I decided to do it. And that
brought her comfort.
Speaker 4 (26:44):
So I figured much comfort is when you as when
you came home safe and sense.
Speaker 3 (26:50):
Sure, sure that was the ultimate comfort. But I think
she understood and she got it. So when my wife
told me, I got it, you know what I mean,
I knew that your mission, that's what you have to do.
But yeah, those are the similarities and and and in
you doing that, man, I just like you said, I'm
(27:10):
sitting here listening to the story. I did not want
to interrupt you. I did not want to ask any
questions because anybody that's listening to this, I wanted to
get the full scope of what you wanted to say
without interruption, to get it out.
Speaker 4 (27:23):
Well. Thanks, thanks, you know, it's uh, it's it's I
don't know how people react on the hearth. I just
think how i'd react, and I still shake my head, going,
that's just an odd thing for somebody to do. But
it didn't seem odd for me when I was asking
the questions before I actually donated, and I was asking
the questions, I remember after I had finished all the tests,
(27:45):
I had to sit around and wait for about three
months for somebody to tell me you've been a proof. Remember,
nobody had done it yet. And every every week that
goes by, how come I haven't heard from them? How
come I haven't heard from them? So one day I
called up the donation center a tory son and go,
how come we haven't heard Well, look, you got to
understand the doctors. They're questioning your mental status. They want
(28:05):
to make sure they're the hippocratic oath says first, do
no harm, don't take a healthy patient and risk his life.
That there's a lot of medical questions there. And my
response probably was rude. Was you know, while they're having
that conversation, there's fifteen people die in every day. I
don't think they care. If I'm willing to do it,
they should at least consider it. Well, So it took
(28:28):
the few months, but eventually, yeah, full speed ahead. And
since then I've met you find this interesting? Maybe I've
met a lot of other folks who ended up donating
to people they don't know since then, and I find
it very interesting. Here's some facts. Most of the people
I've met that have done this are female. Most of
them are heavily believers in God. Most of them I've asked,
(28:53):
are you a risk taker? And they go, what do
you mean? I said, have you ever been skydiving or
bungee jumping? About out of four of them say yes.
They laugh and say yes. So I've kind of started
collecting this. What does somebody who donates look like? Are
you a blood donor? Yes, I've been giving blood my
whole life, so that means that tells me if you
(29:16):
give blood regularly, doesn't mean you're going to give a
kidney away, But if you give a kidney away, there's
a serious chance. Or a regular blood donor, so all
these things that kind of put us in a in
a list or a column. If you're a female, if
you're a believer in God, if you're a blood donor,
of all these things doesn't mean you will, but you could.
Speaker 3 (29:36):
And so yeah, probability very interesting.
Speaker 4 (29:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (29:40):
Now I want to let our listeners know too, because
you have a website it's called do Hey, dude, where's
my kidney? I love you. I love that long. No,
I love it.
Speaker 4 (29:53):
It's like, yes, where's my kidney?
Speaker 3 (29:56):
Where's my car?
Speaker 4 (29:57):
Right?
Speaker 3 (29:57):
Where's my kidney?
Speaker 4 (29:59):
Uh? In a documentary on that website.
Speaker 3 (30:02):
That I watched, Yeah, I watched it, and I love
the way. The other name that comes up to is
one eight hundred give us your kidney dot com. I
noticed that when when I was watching the stories, I
can see that you were on a flight, you are
watching the movie, and then, like you said, what sparked
this was at the end of the film you saw, huh,
(30:23):
donate your kidney, give us your kidney, and that sparked
the interest of what now is you pioneering just by
asking the question for kidney donation? This movie, this film
has been voted best Filmy waymea Ocean Film Festival, Washington
(30:44):
West Naple Valley Film Festival, Twin Cities Film Festival, and
also win Good Humanitarian Film Festival, all the all of
recent in the last ten years. So this is a
questioning the.
Speaker 4 (30:59):
Reason why that film was popular. As people go see
documentary films and usually it's about oh my god, there's
so many plastic particles in the ocean. Oh my god,
this is happening this is terrible. Look, this is not
one of those hurts you stories. This is a happy
way of rafter story. Yeah, it is seeing a movie
like that that when you walk out you feel uplifted,
(31:20):
You feel better about yourself, you feel better about mankind. Yeah,
so it touched a lot of people on and then
I'm you know, my story, My story is the more
people that hear it, see it, touch it, taste it.
Maybe they'll raise your hand one day, maybe not to
do what I did, but maybe they hear a friend needs,
or a coworker needs, or a boss needs. Maybe it
won't be so odd. Maybe the least they won't say yes,
(31:43):
but start asking the questions. Because when you ask questions,
brace yourself. You might get answers that you're okay with them.
Speaker 3 (31:50):
And I'll hear it actually has You have some links
where you're going to you want to become a donor.
You can click on their and get some more insight
on that. And from what I understand, you also have
you're hitting up. You have a chapter in Los Angeles?
Is that great?
Speaker 4 (32:05):
Yeah? Los Angeles is a large city, right, And so
about three and twenty twenty we post it note online
that said, hey, are you an organ donor, specifically a
kidney donor. So we're getting together for a lunch at
this restaurant this time, had no idea how many people
at show up, but about twenty five people showed. I
was shocked. I didn't know that. And since then people
(32:28):
keep reaching out. There's probably one hundred and fifty members
right now, and we all try to share with each other.
How are you promoting? How are you if you were
promoting at all? If we try to provide audiences for
people that might want to hear you, believe it or not.
You know, there's lots of groups that would love to
have people hear you speak about organ donation. Yeah, it's
(32:49):
silch it again, it's odd for lots of people. So
they're all over the country. I know Valerie has got
you know, hers in your neighborhood. There's probably about sixty
or seventy one kidney clubs all over the.
Speaker 3 (33:02):
One Kidney Club yep. So this is the one kidney
Club La that you actually chapter. And then she started
the one Kidney Club Las Vegas. And that's how because
of course you two have something in common, and of
course you guys pass information back to each other and
near each other's mentor so for those that want to
get involved, you can if you just like Herold was saying,
(33:25):
if you're interested, want to answer some questions, He's available
in La here in Las Vegas. There it's information. Corporations
are actually requesting for you to come and speak to
their folks as well. Was that great?
Speaker 4 (33:40):
Absolutely, there's no there's no wrong way to do this.
I've had meetings with Alliance Club, you know, called me
up on So I got to the Chinese restaurant where
they're having me. It's four dudes over the age of
seventy and I'm thinking they don't want to donate. They're
an age where they might need something soon. But every
opportunity I have to share the story, it all works out.
(34:03):
It all works out the way it's supposed to work out,
so large groups, small groups, it's just a good story
to share. And usually I'd like to think, even though
I don't know the ends of the story, that's a
continuing story. But I like to think when I go
to bed at night, somebody that I spoke to that
I don't know that maybe it was ten years ago
they have raised their hand and said i'd like to
(34:25):
do that, and so the ripples just keep going as
long as you keep throwing stones in the river.
Speaker 3 (34:30):
Now, one thing I found interesting is the director producer
of the film Samantha Smith. He's born and raised in
Las Vegas. What yeah is it?
Speaker 4 (34:41):
See my friend of mine? When I tell him I
got a lot of questions about the big G upstairs,
he goes, well, I said, it's just too much of
a coincident. He goes, coincidence is how do you think
these things happen? It's not a coincidence. These things are
chosen to happen. I have questions. I have questions about
that too, But Vegas. Yeah, she's a serious filmmaker and
(35:06):
I don't know how she ended up choosing this story,
but I'm thrilled she did.
Speaker 3 (35:10):
Yes, I'm thrilled too. And if you guys need Harold
to come speak, if you go to the website once again,
do Where's my kidney dot com, you can actually request
him to come to you or to talk on podcasts
like this or anywhere, and he's available to actually share
his heartfelt experience.
Speaker 4 (35:32):
As a Samantha director. And if you want doctors, I've
got contacts with lots of people if you want somebody
in your neighborhood that didn't let me know, I can
find another Herald in your backyard. Probably that I'm working
more than happy chat.
Speaker 3 (35:45):
And I would definitely love for you to do that
for me if you can. So we're doing our part here,
especially with you and your story and my wife and
her story for the kidney donation. We want to make
sure we keep this going and bring awareness. We actually
have a family friend right now, our close friend, who
is going through the same thing and needing a kidney.
He's been on the list for the past year and
a half, so we are praying for him to in
(36:08):
family you know as well. So we're trying to get
him his information that he needs and he's looking for
mentors as well. Now going through all of this, as
we start to wrap up the conversation, I want to
ask you know, I'm a DJ Herald, So with any
(36:29):
mood or anything that you were going through, be it life,
kidney donation, pondering thoughts, need to be in a good
spirit or you're kind of not in a good place
today but you need something to uplift you. What do
you play like? Music sues the soul right as one
of the universal languages that we have here on this earth.
(36:49):
But what do you what do you frequently listen to
in your playlist?
Speaker 4 (36:54):
Don't laugh at me, but I know on my iPhone
it tells me what my most often played artists and
songs are. I won't edit it, but don't laugh at me.
Speaker 3 (37:06):
I won't.
Speaker 4 (37:07):
You're top five and they're not in any order, but
it's five on the list. Bob Dylan, Okay, yeah, I
like Jimmy Cliff. Uh. Let's see, it's a little feet
uh believe it or not. A small group that nobody's
(37:28):
ever heard of. Robin Thompson Band, they're a Virginia band
that was around in the eighties. And led Zeppelin because
it's led Zeppelin.
Speaker 3 (37:36):
This led Zeppelin.
Speaker 4 (37:37):
Now I'm curious about between them in concerts.
Speaker 3 (37:40):
So what's what is the uh for our listeners? So
if they want to look them up? And then that's why
I asked. I love, I love when our guests introduced
new groups to us, because hey, we brought not Horizon.
So what what genre would that be in? Or are
they spread out across several different ones?
Speaker 4 (37:57):
Oh my gosh, yeah, Bob Dylan. Usually it's a early stuff,
which is an acoustic. You got the other end of
the spectrum, the Zeppelin, which is not a hard rock,
but I'll call it hard rock for me. Jimmy clip
is reggae. So these it's like spinning you know, a dial,
and it's hitting opposites. But I love that. It's like
my book reading. I read fiction, I read nonfiction, I
(38:17):
read history. So there's no rule to music. It's whatever
it makes you feel good, so it's all over the map.
Speaker 3 (38:23):
I love that exactly exactly. I feel the same way,
Harold Man. I enjoyed a conversation. I appreciate you, sir
for making yourself available. Is there anything that you would
like to tell our listeners here at the grind of
where we can find you, or any last nuggets that
you want to give anybody that's contemplating or have a
(38:45):
family member that's going through this, what would you like
to tell them before we close out the podcast tonight.
Speaker 4 (38:53):
Yeah, that's a good question. Thanks for asking. So if
you're family member or some of you know that you're
close with is in need, oftentimes what happens is the
person in need can't ask, it's too uncomfortable, so they
get something like an advocate. Sometimes it's a friend, sometimes
it's a family member. And I'm telling you it's organize
(39:16):
a question and answer or ask friends, maybe ten friends.
They get together your house for coffee one Saturday afternoon
and bring in somebody who's done this before. Not to
convince them to donate, but to answer questions and to
share that it's not something so crazy that you might
think it is. Don't ask them to donate, don't ask
them to sign these piece of paper. Just give them
(39:37):
the information and if you want to talk about a
little bit more, you can contact me at Dude, Where's
mykidney dot com and I'll hook you up with people
in your area that are really stellar, people that are
good at this. And again I'm telling you they're not
trying to push people that do anything. It's just information exchange,
and I think that's where the key to this starts.
(39:58):
Asking questions and then any answers.
Speaker 3 (40:01):
Now, you definitely know before we get out here. You
know we're going to have to show up in Los
Angeles so we can actually meet up and sit down
and meet in person when we have a chance, So
please forward to that.
Speaker 4 (40:12):
Yes, I'm very lucky. My wife and I live in Malibu, California.
And before you get all too fancy on me, I
live in a trailer park in Malibu. But it's a
Malibu trailer park. There's wine racks and Viking rangers and everything,
but it's a double wide. You come to LA, I'm
your host. I got you in, no problem.
Speaker 3 (40:29):
Well, we look forward to it, and listeners, please make
sure you check out the information that has been provided
to you, and thank you for listening, Thanks for coming
back and joining us, and we'll see you once again.
Speaker 1 (40:42):
Hey guys, and welcome to the grind E magazine, your
ground zero for all things Jade and v events and
DJ retro. If staying in the note about the hottest
local artist influencers and business owners makes you feel like
a VIP, then you're in the right place. Our latest podcast,
what have you grooving in your living room and getting
inspired by the movies and shakers of your community. Subscribe
(41:04):
to our monthly EVE newsletter for exclusive content, behind the
scenes scoop and first dips on upcoming events. It's like
having a backstage pass to the coolest show in town,
minus the heafty ticket price. Y'all know what I'm talking about.
This is Vegas. Don't forget to follow us on our
social media at the Grind LV. This one is for
my influencers, business owners, local artists and musicians. Are you
(41:26):
all ready to make some noise? Advertise with us The
Grind to get your business, your brand in front of
our savvy, plugged in audience
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