On Wednesday I saw a patient in one of the renal clinics who reminded me that human beings are made of goodness. It was a busy day, one of those days where you feel like you are being pulled in a million different directions; frayed on every end. I had so many tabs open in my brain that I did not have the mental capacity to be fully present with this man. I was just going through the motions: “No complaints, blood pressure normal, kidney functions table, no proteinuria”. Great, easy, next! His diagnosis was “solitary kidney” and he had been following up at this particular clinic for so long that all the doctors before me had stopped writing his full story; the reason why he had a solitary kidney. I was so rushed that I paid it no mind.

When I was wrapping up the consultation, he looked at me emphatically, capturing my full attention. “Doctor”, he said “yesterday was the seventeenth anniversary of my brother’s kidney transplant.” I paused. All the tabs in my brain closed. I felt all my frayed edges rescind. Seventeen years ago this man had donated his kidney to his brother. In doing so, he had given his brother seventeen years of life that he would never have had. That’s seventeen birthdays, seventeen Christmases. The chance to watch is two children matriculate, his daughter get married and the birth of his grandson. That’s three world cup wins!

The joy and pride and pleasure I saw in my patient’s face made my whole week. He wasn’t concerned about the fact that he had sentenced himself to a lifetime of blood tests, and blood pressure checks and waiting in long hospital lines every six months. He was just so grateful that his brother had lived another seventeen years. He wasn’t even concerned that he had possibly shortened his own life in exchange for those seventeen years.

In this dark, selfish period of human existence we find ourselves in, I needed to hear this man’s story. It’s this level of selflessness that restores my faith in humanity. If there are humans out there who have the capacity to literally give away a part of their body for another then surely there is hope for us after all.