Mom Never Expected To Hear Son’s Heartbeat Again, Then Meets Woman Whose Life He Saved
The loss of a loved one is hard to bear. Even as their “spirit returns to God who gave it,” as described in Ecclesiastes 12:7, those left on Earth grieve.
In the case of one California family, though, a part of their son who was taken from them far too soon lives on.
Nineteen-year-old Dylan Stump passed away in 1997 after a freak traffic accident, according to KABC. While on the freeway, he’d become involved in a fender bender while traveling home from college to visit his family.
He ended up stopped on the highway, other cars peeling off around his. But one struck his vehicle at 60 mph.
“Saying the words that Dylan was in a car accident and he may not make it was the hardest thing I ever had to do,” his mother, Dana Stump, confessed.
Even though the young man passed away, his heart lived on as part of an organ transplant program.
That was where Erika Heranic entered the picture.
See, Heranic had experienced a massive heart attack followed by multiple cardiac arrests and a stroke that left her partially paralyzed and blind. To say that she was on death’s door hardly covers it.
Somehow, though, she rallied and ended up on the organ-donor list. She recounted the news that her new heart — Dylan’s heart — was on its way via helicopter, saying, “It’s landing on top of your room, and all of a sudden a sense of calm hit me, and I just thought, I knew … this is it.”
The transplant took, and Heranic regained much of her body’s functioning. Little did she know that her dream of having a new heart also fulfilled one of Dylan’s family.
“When we lost Dylan, having his heart transplanted was our biggest hope,” Stump told Cedars-Sinai.
“We were praying and hoping that we would get to meet his heart recipient.”
They eventually did after Heranic reached out to Stump.
“I wanted to write her a letter, I wanted to get a hold of her,” Heranic said.
On March 25, 2018, they finally met in person. Heranic lowered the collar of her blouse a little, and Stump took out a stethoscope so she could listen to her son’s beating heart.
“The minute I heard it, I was like, that is Dylan’s heart. It sounds just like his heart, which is crazy,” Stump said.
She has since learned that Dylan’s organs went to five different donors.
“It’s beauty from ashes. He was very special,” she said. “If he knew how many lives he has saved, he’d say it was all worth it. That’s just the kind of person he was.”
The two women now share a special bond and honor Dylan’s life by speaking for OneLegacy, a non-profit that saves lives through organ donations, according to KABC.
“I usually speak first and I always finish and I do say she’s our silver lining because she’s here,” Stump said.
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