Real People Real Stories
Deanna Ensign
A match made in
HEAVEN
D
by Anthony Grosso
photo by Andrew Andreozzi
eanna Ensign is a 6th grade Social Studies teacher in South Jersey. In 2017, she made one of the biggest decisions of her life by doing one of the most selfless acts a person could do. She donated a kidney to a man on dialysis, allowing him to survive and see his two daughters grow up. Robert “Boots” Nocille was the recipient; a man featured in last year’s Real People, Real Stories edition of
this magazine. In 2008, Boots was diagnosed with Polycystic Kidney Disease, a genetic disorder in which many cysts grow in and on the kidney causing them to eventually lose functions. In an effortless search by family and friends, there weren’t any matches that seemed possible for Boots. Then came Deanna Ensign. “I met Boots in August of 2015 when my daughter began playing soccer on a new team where Boots was one of the coaches,” Ensign explains. “I was completely blown away when I came across a Facebook page that was set up to spread the word that he was in need of a kidney. I had no idea. He seemed totally fine on the sidelines of the soccer field.” Becoming acquainted through soccer and their young daughters’ friendship, Ensign got tested to see if she was a match. “I’m an organ donor, it’s marked on my driver’s license,” she says. “But it never crossed my mind to be a living donor until I heard that Boots was sick.” Though the odds seemed to be stacked against them, Ensign tested to match. As Ensign began to process everything that was about to happen, she questioned herself as to what she would do if she re-
ally did turn out to be a match. In what seemed like the very last chance for Boots, this was a perfect match. The moment Ensign found out that her kidney would work for Boots, she had no hesitation at all. She knew what she had to do. “I was absolutely shocked that a lady I’ve only known a year and a half would give me her kidney,” Boots told Philadelphia RowHome Magazine last year. A few setbacks delayed the testing and surgery at first. “I pulled my back out and was barely able to walk for about one and a half months,” Ensign says. “After numerous chiropractic appointments, my back got better but then summer got in the way and I was pretty busy having two girls from Spain staying with our family for a month. The other setback included an irregular mammogram in which I had to first have an ultrasound done to look at the irregular cells. And when they didn’t like those results, a biopsy was done to make sure all was okay. Fortunately, everything tested out to be fine.” The surgery finally took place just last April. Everything ended up going smoothly that day, however
Ensign developed an infection two weeks into recovery. “I had high fevers and severe stomach cramping to the point I couldn’t sit up or stand,” she says. “I went into the hospital on a Saturday morning and remained there until the next Friday. I had to undergo many tests and they never did get a definitive answer as to what was wrong so I was just given a blanket diagnosis of an infection within my body.” Now, both Ensign and Boots are going to be just fine. It’s an amazing thought that you can actually hand someone else one of your own organs to give them a newly revived life. This is what Ensign has done for a great man and his family. Post-surgery, she says that she would not change one thing. “I feel one thousand times better than I ever felt before,” Ensign says. Though Ensign’s daughter is now on a different soccer team, she and her family remain close to Boots, his daughters and wife Nicole by keeping in touch via phone calls and texts. To find out more about becoming an organ donor and to register, visit www.donatelife.net. Ensign recommends that anyone who is healthy enough should consider getting tested to donate an organ if someone they know is in need. “There is no greater reward than knowing you did something to make a difference and in this case, it happened to be that it saved someone’s life.” PRH
| ROWHOME MAGAZINE | 53
April / May / June 2018