WJW Staff

They'd been close friends for 30 years, having met through their synagogue ‹ the Orthodox Southeast Hebrew Congregation-Knesset Yeshoshua in Silver Spring.

But Silver Spring's Alan Sussman says he didn't know before Pesach that his friend, with whom he had been co-leading a Torah study group, had been seriously ill. His wife, Shoshana, came home one day from a synagogue tefillah (prayer) group and announced she learned his friend was in need of a donor kidney ‹ and had the same blood type as her husband: A-positive.

Sussman's first reaction to her suggestion that he donate a kidney, he says, was "well, thanks a lot!"

His next thought: "Wait a second ‹ why not?"

That second thought represented a leap the 59-year-old engineer for the Federal Aviation Administration, a father of seven and grandfather of 10, could not have undertaken at an earlier stage of his life.

"I've had a history of being terrified of doctors, needles," Sussman says. Also, "I used to be a tremendous hypochondriac." The potent mix of fears resulted in his experiencing a life of worry and anxiety.

"Then 9/11 happened," Sussman says, which led to a turning point in his life.

Unable to stop thinking about the horror of that day, Sussman began to work with a psychologist, Dr. Neil Weissman in Baltimore, "to help me deal with my anxiety," he says.

At the same time, he began to engage in the spiritual practices of Mussar, a Jewish spiritual movement that has followers focusing on working on their personal characteristics, he explains.

The two approaches ‹ psychology and spirituality ‹ were "very complementary," Sussman says. He learned to be a calmer, more relaxed person ‹ "more at peace with myself" and more practical about facing his fears.

Then, within the past two years, two health-related scares came along to test his changing attitudes. The first ‹ bouts of dizziness ‹ had him seeing a neurologist, but nothing wrong was found with his brain, he says. However, a suspicious spot on his thyroid was discovered, which sent him to yet another specialist, and more testing. Again, "nothing wrong" was found, Sussman notes.

Yet, throughout what might have been a terrifying experience for him, Sussman noticed a quiet miracle taking place.

"I was amazed at how calm I felt, taking one day at a time, one hour at a time," he says. Instead of worrying and fearing the worst, "I began to dwell on the blessings of good health as never before."

So when his wife came home that day in April and told him about his friend, "the old me immediately stood up and shrunk back in horror," he says ‹ but then he simply realized that "I had a close friend who was very sick, and I had to keep him around." (The friend declined to be interviewed, and asked not to be named in this article.)

Instead of shrinking in horror from the needles, Sussman says he came to feel "absolutely euphoric" that "for once in my life, God said to me, 'Just this one time, I'm giving you the power to make a difference.' It was such a wonderful feeling."

It was a feeling that, at one point, had him literally skipping in the halls at work.

He counts "the day after Sukkot" ‹ when he learned he had been accepted as a donor ‹ as "one of the happiest days of my life."

As for his boss and colleagues at the FAA, they were all completely supportive of what he was doing, he says. The surgery took place Dec. 13 at the University of Maryland Medical Center in Baltimore, and Sussman was given paid leave ‹ apart from annual or sick leave ‹ as part of a federal program that supports employees who wish to make blood marrow or organ donations.

His family were all supportive, as well, and it was comforting to him to have his wife stay with him in the hospital the first night, and, the second night, one of his daughters, Malka ‹ "aka Florence Nightingale," Sussman quips. A registered nurse who works at Children's Hospital in the District, she was especially helpful in assessing his condition and interacting with his doctors, he says.

Thanks to a laparoscopic surgical procedure (unlike the older kidney transplant procedure that required a large incision in the back and a longer hospital stay for donors), Sussman was home after a couple of days. He expects to return to work in several weeks.

For now, he has some pain, tires easily and admits to feeling "hemmed in" and eager to get back to the activities he loves: playing music with his band, Ashira, and fixing things around the house.

But he stays busy fielding phone calls from well-wishers; communicating with new online friends he's met on organ donation listservs he's discovered in the past six months; and with various writing projects and studies, including preparation for testing for s'micha (rabbinic ordination).

As for his friend, he is apparently doing well and "sounds upbeat, very optimistic," Sussman says, when the two talk.

For himself, Sussman is eager to share his experiences as an organ donor ‹ focusing on the life changes that enabled him to make his gift.

"I did not set out to be an organ donor," he says, noting he never could have done it for a stranger, as some he's met on the organ donor listservs have done.

But when he was asked, as part of the psychological screening for the procedure, to consider how he'd feel if he gave a kidney and it was rejected by the recipient's body, or the recipient did not survive, Sussman found the answer in another question: "How would I feel if I never gave? I want my friend to be healthy."