"Looking for someone 2 donate me their Kidney! Must have type O blood :) (You only need one kidney)."
These were the exact words posted at the back of 24-year-old Maine resident Christine Royles' car, in her search for a kidney donor.
Prior to her kidney transplant, Royles would spend 10 hours every night hooked up to a dialysis machine. She would come home to this machine after work at Applebee's, even when she was diagnosed with lupus and ANCA vasculitis. The disease further led to kidney failure.
Royles was included on a list of 100,000 kidney transplant hopefuls in 2014.
Luck turned out of her car advertisement when Royles received a call in March from would-be donor Josh Dall-Leighton. The 30-year-old Dall-Leighton, a father of three and a corrections officer, was then a complete stranger to Royles. He stumbled upon Royles' ad while on a random shopping trip.
They were almost ready to go through with the transplant but faced a few setbacks, as legal issues were raised regarding the donation. The Dall-Leightons created a GoFundMe page for the donation and raised almost $50,000. A question was therefore raised as to whether or not Dall-Leighton intended to profit from the donation.
After a three-month long wait, the Maine Medical Center saw no reason why the surgery should not proceed. The hospital saw no intent to profit on Dall-Leighton's part.
"If my wife needed a kidney and I couldn't provide for her, I would hope that somebody else would kind of step up and help her out," Dall-Leighton said.
On Tuesday, two separate surgeries were performed on Dall-Leighton and Royles at the Maine Medical Center. Dall-Leighton's wife Ashley noticed that Royles seemed very nervous before the surgery. According to Ashley, her husband stood by Royles' side, assuring her that everything would be fine.
The hospital's spokesperson Matt Paul announced that the surgeries were both successful. They expect a strong recovery from the donor and the recipient alike.
Dall-Leighton plans to donate part of the raised funds to a kidney foundation or to the hospital's neonatal ICU where their twins were previously treated.
