metro

Perfect 'Match'

Oak Park woman's bone marrow donation
saves the life of a Jordanian man.

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2002930

24 June 4 • 2015

Elizabeth Applebaum

Special to the Jewish News

A

t first, all Dena Hyman
Rosenberg knew was that he
was male and had leukemia.
Then she would discover his name
was Sarry, and he and Dena had every-
thing in common and nothing in com-
mon.
Three years later, the lives of these
two are linked in an extraordinary way,
across thousands of miles, though they
have never met.
It began with a phone call just before
Shabbat.
Dena had participated in a bone mar-
row drive, hoping to find a match for
a little girl named Ayelet. All results
are kept on file at the National Bone
Marrow Registry, and while Dena was
not able to help Ayelet, the Friday eve-
ning call was to tell her that she might
be a match for someone else. His name,
she would learn, was Sarry Dandah. He
was 25, an engineer from Jordan.
So Dena, 38, who lives in Southfield,
went in for testing. The result: She was
not only a candidate, she was a near-
perfect match. "It's as though you were
brother and sister:' she was told.
This "brother" was living in Amman
and had been diag-
nosed with leukemia
in 2008, while he
was a student in
Bath, England. Sarry
underwent chemo-
therapy treatments for
six months and was
declared cancer-free.
Bone marrow
Sixty days later, he was
recipient Sarry told the disease was
Dandah
back, and this time he
needed a bone mar-
row transplant.
No one in his family was a match,
so Sarry turned to the National Bone
Marrow Registry.
"I was very excited to learn that Dena
was a match:' he says. At that point, all
I wanted was to get the procedure over
and done with and to get back on with
my life. I was also worried that it might
not go as planned.
"I grew up in a Christian family,
although I don't consider myself very
religious:' he adds. "However, I do
believe that faith is important to help
get through tough times:'

Marrow donor Dena Hyman Rosenberg (in black dress) and her family: sons
Yishai Hyman, 11, and Yair Hyman, 13, son-in-law Jonathan Schwartz and daugh-
ter Sara at their wedding, and daughters Yakira Hyman, 11, and Yara Hyman, 14.

Dena, meanwhile, reviewed every
aspect of the procedure and its possible
consequences with her father, Dr. Jerry
Rosenberg. Usually, there are no prob-
lems for the donor. But Dena, a speech
pathologist and divorced mom of five,
wondered: What if something did go
wrong? She decided to write a will, and
she spent a long time discussing the
situation with her children — Sara, a
nurse, and Yara, Yair, Yakira and Yishai,
all of whom attend Akiva Hebrew Day
School in Southfield.
But her main fear: What if she wasn't
able to save Sarry?

Successful Match

In the weeks before the procedure, Dena
underwent extensive exams, and days
before, she had a series of shots that left
her exhausted and achy. The transfu-
sion began with a 15-minute procedure
to insert a port into her vein, and then
meant lying on a gurney for eight hours.
Dena brought her mom, Helene, some
books and her iPod, filled with Guns-n-
Roses music.
Less than 24 hours later, Sarry
received his transfusion in Texas and
waited 30 days to learn that his body
had accepted Dena's marrow. He must
continue taking pills for years to come,
but the procedure was a success.

Though either participant in a bone
marrow procedure can remain anony-
mous, both Dena and Sarry opted to
meet online. They hope to meet in per-
son one day, and meanwhile they stay in
contact through Facebook.
It is, they know, an uncommon con-
nection: a Jewish woman in Metro
Detroit and a man in Jordan.
"You helped save the life of someone
in Jordan?" Dena has heard. But it was
never even a question for her. "And
would I do this again? Absolutely:'
Sarry, whose hobbies include sports,
reading, playing guitar and photography,
says: "My parents have always valued
education, and they always kept our
household full of books and magazines.
This has enabled my younger brothers
and me to tolerate other people's opin-
ions and respect the other.
"I respect all people for their actions
first and foremost:' he says. "I am very
grateful for Dena's actions; she has saved
my life.
"There are good and bad people in
this world, and we always need remind-
ing that before we identify with a cer-
tain religious or ethnic group, we are all
humans at the end of the day:'

❑

For information about the National Bone

Marrow Registry, go to bethematch.org.

