Spotlight: Bill Klahn

Transplant Olympian Receives the Gift of Life

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Meeting the Donor Family

After talking to some of his transplant friends on the team, Bill decided to make contact with his donor’s family. He "cried for an entire day" when he received a picture of his donor, Sarah, a 23-year-old mother of three who died quickly and unexpectedly of an aneurism caused by a brain disease.

Meeting his donor’s family has been life changing. It was one of the hardest things he ever had to do because he was so “consumed with guilt that [he] got to live and [Sarah] didn’t.”

Sarah’s mother, Jo Leah, has since become Bill’s “second Mom.” He speaks endearingly of her. “We’re great friends, I call her all the time. I call her on Christmas. I call her on Mother’s Day.”

“[The meeting] was real powerful,” he told me while his brown eyes glistened with tears. “My life is a tribute to [Sarah] and that’s how it’s supposed to be.”

Almost everything he does, he does to preserve the memory of Sarah, whose liver is still alive inside of him. He even eats cheesecake every year for her birthday in November because it was her favorite.

“I want to go to bed early so I can get a good work out in the next day,” he says. “That’s what I want to do. I owe it to my donor to live a clean and healthy life.”

Goals in life

I asked him what his goals are now that he’s alive and healthy. He told me that he wants to be an in-home personal trainer. Because some people are too self-conscious to go to the gym, he wants to bring the gym to them.

“I’ve got some dumbbells. You don’t need all this,” he tells me motioning his arms around large room full of exercise equipment. “You don’t need a gym or fancy clothes. You can do pushups and Pilates and yoga movements on the ground using gravity. It’s functional exercising,” he said, his wide eyes shining with excitement.

Currently he is training for the next World Transplant Games in Sweden in 2011. Since his illness and transplant, he has yet to win a gold medal. During the Australian Games in 2008, he was eight-tenths of a second behind the gold medal winner in the 50-meter breaststroke, which is his best event.

When he wins that gold medal he wants to give it to his donor’s mother.

“That’s why I want to go to Sweden and win a gold medal. Not for me but for her,” he said clearing his throat and wiping his teary eyes. “That’s my biggest goal.”

I waited for him to gain composure and wipe his tears. I asked him what he wanted to do in the meantime.

“I just want to have fun,” he says smiling. “For a year and a half I thought I was going to die. I got a second chance at life, and I’m not gonna be serious and stern. I gotta do it for my donor,” he says softly, “because Sarah gave me the gift of life.”

Bites of Bill

• Number of medals won: over 70 medals in swimming competitions, mostly gold.
• Hobbies: Besides working out, Bill enjoys making people smile with his jokes and playing the harmonica.
• Favorite joke: When he first walked up to the front desk of the hospital to get his transplant, after the secretary asked, “May I help you?” he responded by saying: “Yeah. I’d like a liver, hold the onions.”
• Biggest shock after transplant: How long it would take him to do sit-ups. It took him three years to be able to do one sit up. Now he can do 20.
• Advice for people who want to workout: “Getting to the gym is harder than working out. You gotta have the discipline. It’s all mental.”
• Biggest pet peeve: Overly processed foods and cakes disguised as muffins with paper wrappers.
• Nineteen people die each day waiting for an organ donation. To become a donor or learn more about organ donation, please visit www.IowaDonorRegistry.com.

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