Adrian, Donor

Adrian believed in gifting life and hope...

Adrian was so many things… He was my beloved son, an amazing brother, a loving fiancé, an adoring father of two little girls, a firefighter, an avid motorcyclist, and one of the best friends you could ever ask for. He had an ability to see the best in others and, perhaps more importantly, to help them see it as well.

He was quick witted, funny, smart and kind. Adrian was beautiful inside and out. He had a way of lighting up a room.

He was a competitive athlete and could be aggressive on a basketball court, but in life he was slow to anger. He was the one you went to with problems. He just always seemed to have the answers.

Adrian was a donor from his first license. He would gladly walk into a burning building to help someone he didn’t know, and would probably never know, of course he believed in gifting life in event of his passing.

As luck and life would have it, Adrian finished his shift at the fire station one beautiful bright December morning and decided to go run errands with one of his best friends. It was a motorcycle ride he would never come home from. And it was bittersweet. Our family lost its bright light, the sun in our universe. But Adrian wasn’t finished. He gave life-giving gifts to three individuals, along with tissue donation to recipients. In December 2019, he went in for his final surgery, organ recovery… And I won’t lie, our family cried at our loss. But could there have been more absolutely beautiful gift for him to give those other families just in time for Christmas?? Even at our most heartbroken, we couldn’t help but be happy for those he helped and their families. There are no better gifts than life, love and hope. I think of those families often, and honestly I believe they kept me sane in the days and months following our loss. For that I thank our hero, our Superman, and I thank those families as well for allowing him to continue on and save another life as he left this world.