HOLLAND (WHTC-AM/FM) — Mark and Lynn Scotch’s visit to Michigan is taking an unusual path.
He is pedaling a bicycle; she is driving the family SUV nearby, in case his bike has a mechanical issue or the weather is too severe. The Plover WI, couple started in Martha’s Vineyard, heading through New York, Ohio, Indiana Plover, WI, by way of what he calls “The Organ Trail.” Photo gallery: whtc.com/pictures.
His bicycle trip aims at promoting kidney disease awareness and encouraging kidney donation.
They reached Holland on Sunday, Oct. 10, 2021, with little fanfare, checking into the Haworth Hotel with plans to heading toward Muskegon after breakfast at one of Holland’s Eighth Street restaurants.
The Scotches are the kind of Midwesterners who talk to strangers, which is exactly how they ended up on the bike-SUV journey, and an earlier one, from Wisconsin to Natchitoches, LA. That’s the town where the Scotches met a former jockey, Hugh Smith, at a microbrewery. The casual conversation between relative strangers took a turn when Smith said goodbye and Mark Scotch teased him about having an early night. Smith said he needed to go home for dialysis to deal with Stage 4 renal failure, a daily pattern he’d follow until he got a new kidney.
Though Scotch blurted out he’d donate one of his, the offer wasn’t precisely spontaneous, he told WHTC on Sunday.
“I knew you could donate a kidney and live,” he said. His sister-in-law had donated a kidney to a childhood friend 14 years earlier.
But more than 40 years ago, he and Lynn suffered the death of their first son, after he ended up on life support at 15 months. They didn’t know that much about organ donation at the time, and later wished they had.
“It always bothered my wife that we never had been able to utilize that option for our son. It sounds strange but it was almost like a gift to my wife, to complete something we did, you know, that we knew we thought about for years,” he said. They didn’t let on to their three adult sons or three grandkids right away.
“We waited ’til we were into it pretty deep,” he said, before letting their sons know about the plan.
As easy as Mark Scotch’s offer was, getting the job done got complicated. For starters, he and Smith weren’t a great match in the kidney department. But Scotch and Smith were coordinating the donation through the National Kidney Registry, kidneyregistry.org; National Kidney Donation Organization, nkdo.org. Those groups help kidney recipients and donors navigate the red tape involved. There’s also a voucher program for when potential donor-recipient don’t match. They are matched with others, and the voucher puts the waiting recipient at the front of the line for the next kidney.
Scotch had his surgery in September, 2020, at which point Lynn Scotch decides to get on the registry, too. But complications set in. She and Smith each contracted COVID. Both survived. Smith got his new kidney last February. Lynn Scotch is waiting for her blood tests to show she’s fully recovered from the coronavirus.
On Monday, weather permitting, Mark Scotch will head north on his bike, to Muskegon. He aims to be back home on Oct. 16, if possible. Although he has some financial support for the ride, it’s not about making any money. The Scotches aren’t taking donations, though they’re always pleased to learn people have sent money to transplant organizations. The Scotches and Smith remain great friends. Like brothers, Mark Scotch said, they talk about once a week.
They just want people to know a few facts: 13 people of all ages die every day, waiting for a kidney. Healthy people who donate a kidney while living can continue living active lives — which is the point of Scotch’s long rides. People can also register for organ donation in the event of a sudden death in Michigan by signing up while getting a driver’s license.
Scotch’s Organ Trail blog is online at theorgantrailhm.wordpress.com/about-2.
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