CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — A family in Sinton had an emotional reunion Friday when they finally met the woman that saved their daughters life with her bone marrow. The Corpus Christi International Airport played host to the special reunion between Laynie Houser and her bone marrow donor, Alyssa Kohls.
It all started back in May of 2015 when the Houser family was hit with big news. Their 7 year old daughter was diagnosed with a rare and life threatening disease, Aplastic Anemia. According to the Mayo Clinic, Aplastic anemia is a condition that occurs when your body stops producing enough new blood cells.
The Housers were told the only way to cure their daughter was to find a bone marrow donor. Something that's not as easy you might think. But luckily the Houser's were one of the luck ones, able to find a match.
"They just kept saying we are working on it, we're working on it. We have expectations. We are going to find a match, and we did," said Laynie's mother, Holly.
That match was in the form of Alyssa Kohls, a surgical nurse from Wisconsin. She got the idea to sign up to be a donor when she hosted a bone marrow sign up drive in college. But she says she never expected anything to come out of it.
"You hear those stories of, 'Oh, I went on and never got a phone call,' so I just assumed the same would happen for me and a year and a half later my phone rang and it was unreal," said Alyssa.
After agreeing to donate and undergo additional tests, Kohl's bone marrow was sent off to Laynie. And two years later the two finally got to meet, more than 1,300 miles away.
And on Good Friday of 2017, Alyssa's bone marrow began to flow inside of Laynie's body providing her a new life.
To find out more about how you can sign up to become a bone marrow donor, just visit bethematch.org.