A gift to many
Jeff Saleeby left more than good memories of a life well lived when he died in April of a heart attack at 32.
Jeff and his brother, Mike, were getting ready to install a swimming pool for Ayrington Fancher as part of the Kids Wish Network. They weren’t charging for their company’s labor. Ayrington’s story was on the front page of Northwest Montgomery County Neighbors section Thursday, July 24.
I thought you’d like the rest of the story from Jeff’s mother.
Jeff’s unexpected death left things up in the air. But his brother decided to complete the task as a memorial for his brother.
But Jeff left more. As an organ donor, his life touch 50 others, according to his mother, Debbie Dunaway.
His liver went a 12-year-old girl in Minnesota. One of his kidneys went to a older man on the East Coast, the other to a man on the West Coast. His skin went to Cincinnati and Texas. In Cincinnati, it was used as skin grafts for badly burned children. In Texas, it was used for grafts on an Army soldier burned in Iraq.
His corneas gave sight to two Dayton-area folks. In all, 50 people received a part of Jeff, his mother said.
“When they told me he was brain dead, someone approached me to say that Jeff had indicated on the back of his drivers license that he wanted to be a donor,” Dunaway said.
“That was what Jeff was about,” she said.
When the Kids Wish Network first approached Jeff to see if he would be interested in helping Ayrington, Dunaway said her son was excited and wanted her opinion.
“I just asked him, ‘What do you think the Lord would want you to do?’ That just settled it for him,” she said.
There were more people involved in Ayrington’s pool.
Swim ‘n Play had donated the pool, Reliable Electric donated the electrical hook up, Miller Brothers Gravel Inc. donated the sand and Hageman Trucking donated a truck to haul the sand.
All for a 12-year-old Dayton-area boy whom none had never met.
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