Happily Ever After: The Life-Changing Power of a Grateful Heart (28 page)

Every day, after J.R. completed his own treatments, he went on his rounds, visiting other patients. The opportunity to serve his country as a soldier had been taken away, but by sharing his experience with fellow patients, he realized that he still had the opportunity to serve and to inspire, and on a much more personal level.

Thankfully for everyone who has come to know him or about him, J.R.’s ability to inspire has grown far past the walls of the hospital. He became a motivational speaker; an actor on the daytime drama
All My Children
, in which he was cast in the role of an actual veteran; the winner of the thirteenth season of
Dancing with the Stars
; the author of a best-selling memoir,
Full of Heart: My Story of Survival, Strength, and Spirit
; and now the host of his own Newstalk radio show. To date, J.R. has shared his story with millions of people, and I have no doubt he’ll touch millions more lives in the years to come.

Through his tragic experience, J.R. found meaning, just as his mom once assured him he would. With a purpose bigger than himself, he connects to others daily, letting them know that they have a choice in life. He tells people that you can
choose to see your circumstances as a curse or a blessing, regardless of whether you usually lean toward optimism or pessimism. And after living through the stuff that nightmares are made of, J.R. Martinez has had every reason to succumb to the anger and pain and darkness and exist as a pessimist for the rest of his life. Instead, he has chosen to see the explosion as a blessing. He has chosen to survive and thrive, to be grateful and inspire. With the help of his mother and the flick of a light switch, J.R. made a choice to fight for himself and for other victims instead of fighting against his circumstances and the world.

And if he can, we all can.

A B
ODY OF
B
LESSINGS

Many people dedicate their lives to careers that save lives. They are first responders and life-flight pilots; nurses, doctors, and surgeons; chemists and philanthropists; police officers and soldiers . . . and the list goes on. We rely on them to heal us, answer the calls we make to 911, protect us from violence, and fight our wars. They are the true heroes.

Sometimes, though, heroes come from more “ordinary” walks of life. After hearing the story of Jamie Bradfield, the owner of a construction company, I couldn’t help but think of him as one of those extraordinary “ordinary” heroes—a hero who found the path to a lifelong blessing.

It was in the fall of 2012 that Jamie first connected with Thomas Jones. Thomas’s family had been members of the same church Jamie’s family attended for two years, but up until then Jamie had met them only in passing. One Sunday
morning before delivering his sermon, the pastor at First United Methodist Church in LaGrange, Georgia, informed the congregation that ten-year-old Thomas needed a new kidney. The family was looking for people with Type O blood to get tested as a possible match to save this boy, born with a genetic kidney disease. With a new organ, he could say good-bye to ten-hour daily dialysis treatments and actually have a childhood—and a future.

Initially, Jamie (who has O-positive blood) didn’t respond, but over the course of the next month, he kept reading the notices in the church bulletins and newsletters calling for willing applicants. He thought: What the heck? What are the odds?

So Jamie had his blood drawn, and a couple weeks later he learned he was a match. With another applicant ahead of him in line, he figured he had missed the boat, so he went back to his life. A month went by. Then Jamie got a call from a nurse at the hospital, explaining that after the second round of testing, the first applicant wasn’t an option anymore. She asked if he would still be willing to proceed. In that moment, his decision became real and time stood still.

Jamie’s mind flashed back to eleven years earlier when he and his wife, Claire, were doing anything and everything they could to become parents for the second time.

After being told for most of her adult life that Claire would be physically incapable of having children, they had hearts full of hope that God would bless them with another miracle, just as He had their daughter, Sara Kate, who was conceived the old-fashioned way only ten months into their marriage. Jamie and Claire then continued to try for seven long years to get the news that they were once
again pregnant. “We did in-vitro fertilization and a host of other methods to get pregnant, and all we got was financially strapped,” he said. Finally, they accepted that they were a one-child family, and moved on. As is often the case, once they had given up, Claire found out she was pregnant. However, when they went in for the first ultrasound at ten weeks, the obstetrician could find only “clutter.” He speculated that she had miscarried and recommended scheduling a D & C, a procedure that would clean out her uterus. But when pressed, the doctor conceded he wasn’t 100 percent certain that the baby wasn’t still alive. Without certainty, Jamie and Claire were having a difficult time believing that it was God’s plan that they lose this precious gift. Recognizing their pain, the doctor suggested that they wait another week and then come in for another ultrasound. They agreed.

After five days, though, Jamie’s anxious wife couldn’t stand the suspense any longer and they called their doctor. Making time for them to come in that day, Claire’s obstetrician arranged to do the ultrasound and proactively scheduled a visit to the operating room for the D & C right after that—just in case.

When Jamie and Claire got to the office, the atmosphere was funereal, with nurses crying and the doctor somber. But the mood instantly changed from sadness to joy when the ultrasound immediately showed a strong heartbeat!

Now, flash forward to the moment that time stood still. Jamie didn’t know the little boy who needed a kidney that well, but he did know he was the same age as Sam, the child Jamie and Claire believe God miraculously gave back to them ten years earlier. That’s all it took. On January 3, 2013, Jamie gave one of his kidneys to that little boy.

In a Christmas letter Jamie sent out to his friends and family shortly before the surgery, he wrote:

“Know that all you have is a gift from God and give thanks for those gifts. If you have the opportunity to do good for someone else, do it! It may not be the gift of an organ, but I am sure there will be other opportunities. The gifts you will receive in return will be immeasurable.”

For ten years, Jamie and Thomas were virtual strangers. They traveled in similar community circles, but with a thirty-eight-year age difference, they had no natural reason to connect. A horrible disease, a caring church, a healthy “spare” kidney, a matching blood type, and a heart full of generosity bound them so much that they now consider each other friends.

Lifelong friends.

And even after Jamie endured painful medical procedures that left permanent scars, the positives for him far surpassed the negatives: he was able to give the gift of quality of life to a boy who was finally able to experience a world beyond the hospital walls. It was a path Jamie hadn’t considered until that fateful day at church, but one he is forevermore grateful to have been a part of.

P
ROFESSIONAL
S
ACRIFICE AND
P
ERSONAL
R
EWARD

In the blended and mostly harmonious family known as
The Bachelor
franchise, we bond over shared experiences and the bizarre world we live in where millions of strangers tune in weekly to watch our unconventional love stories unfold. Not only did I find my true love and my destiny through the show, but I’ve been lucky enough to add household names like Chris Harrison, Jillian Harris, Andrew Firestone,
Emily Maynard, Ashley Hebert, and Sean Lowe to my list of friends. Some of my strongest connections, though, are with people from behind the scenes. They are the producers, director, set designers, stylists, camera operators, and even sound technicians whose job is to create a show that people will want to watch. Sometimes their agendas don’t align with the “talent,” but I respect that they have a job to do, and at the very least, many of them are good (
very
good, in fact) at comedic relief.

Karri-Leigh Mastrangelo is one of those people. She didn’t come on board Mike Fleiss’s production team until I was an old married broad, but we met when she was expecting a baby and helping prepare us to show off our own baby on an
After the Final Rose
special—and we instantly clicked. Through the years, we’ve stayed in touch—mostly when it involved appearances I made with the franchise, but now that she has moved on to produce other shows, we bond over how entertaining it is to be a parent and encourage each other with the different projects we find on our plates.

Contemplating a foray into the world of blogging, Karri-Leigh (KL to me) reached out to me for advice. I had only a tiny amount of experience with this relatively new medium, but productive-mom-to-productive-mom, I was happy to offer my insights. Without knowing what she would title it or what she would write about, I knew without a doubt that she would offer the blogosphere a fresh and witty perspective on life, Hollywood, and parenthood, and I was right. For two years now, she has written tons of posts and has attracted a huge number of readers.

One of those blog posts caught my eye. I was hard at work on this book and I had a big problem: writer’s block. Taking a
break from writing, I sat down to go through my e-mail, and Karri-Leigh’s latest post on her Dirty Laundry & Dirty Diapers website popped up. Not only did this break give me some energy, but it also offered a perfect illustration of the gratitude we feel from the surprises hidden in our professional journey. Thankfully, KL happily agreed to let me reprint the post here, while graciously adding a few more tidbits just for your reading pleasure. (Thanks, KL, and thank you to Diane Sawyer for pointing her in my direction.)

I’m often asked how I got into television. The truth is that I grew up wanting to be a child psychologist. In college, I started out studying elementary education for moderate special needs, but I knew after my very first rotation as a student teacher in the second grade of an affluent Massachusetts town that the field wasn’t for me. The job saddened me. One beautiful girl, barely seven years old, suffered from liver issues. Her classmate, consistently late to school, wasn’t distracted by cartoons but by his alcoholic mother—and this wasn’t even the special needs room.

The teacher whom I was supporting told me that in her first years of teaching she dreaded Friday afternoons, as she’d miss and worry about her students over the weekend. Unlike the vast majority of professionals, she could hardly wait for Monday morning to arrive. “If you don’t feel that way, this isn’t the job for you,” she said. Clearly, it wasn’t the job for me.

Next on my list of who I wanted to be when I grew up was Diane Sawyer. So I changed my major, made a great demo reel, and wasted an obnoxious amount of money on headshots.

My very first job was at a production company housed in Boston’s ABC affiliate, WCVB. I knew from the moment I stepped into their newsroom that the energy behind the camera, not in front of it, was what I craved. Immediately I pursued producing, with great success, but part of me often wondered if I had made the right decision.

A few years, a cross-country move and a marriage later, my passion brought me to Los Angeles. Making my mark in television wasn’t easy, but eventually the hard work paid off. I was offered the chance to work on a groundbreaking show called
Welcome to the Neighborhood
for ABC. I was more than willing and ready to take on the challenge, but, still a newlywed, committing to living for the next several months in Austin, Texas, was not an easy decision. Ultimately, I asked for (and received) my husband’s support and set out to verify whether this was truly the best professional path for me. I made the supreme sacrifice. I left my entire life behind and crossed my fingers that I wouldn’t lose it all in the process.

After months of casting and preparation, principal shooting began. Several “diverse” but upstanding families would compete to win a home in a very white, Christian, and Republican neighborhood—a home they otherwise would never be able to afford, in a place where they may not have been welcome. Time flew by and in no time at all we were shooting our first elimination with a family of professional tattoo artists.

Shuffled off into their exit interviews, they were feeling unwanted and dejected. I held the hand of their beautiful six-year-old daughter—ready to get her perspective on film.

She sat on the curb while I sat on the pavement, and I asked her why she thought her family was the first to be sent home. She had yet to enter the first grade, but spoke more eloquently than most high school graduates. We cried together as she expressed how hard it is to have people make assumptions about her parents based solely upon their looks. I knew in that moment that I was doing what I was meant to do. I was having my producer cake and therapeutically eating it too.

Unfortunately, the world didn’t get to see that interview—or any of the incredible stories that proceeded to unfold, for that matter. Hours before our premiere, the National Fair Housing Alliance threatened to sue ABC on the grounds that the show violated anti-discrimination housing laws. Sadly, it was shelved.

My heart truly broke. Professionally, I cried because an incredible social experiment, in which everyday people opened up their homes, hearts, and minds in an effort to break down prejudices way too common in this country, would have a fraction of the outreach it deserved. Selfishly, I cried because the many personal struggles I had endured for the project had seemingly been for naught. Or had they?

The gay couple who won the Austin home in the end still got to share it with their adopted son. They have since married, and adopted once more. I still hear from the previously narrow-minded families who lived in the neighborhood, who reflect upon the experience as mind-opening and transformative. As for the innocent six-year-old, we’ve long lost touch, but I think of her often. Years after that interview,
its camera operator referred me for a job that would again be a life-changing experience—it took me to
The Bachelor
, which, ultimately, brought me to cherished friendships and memories, and a blog for you.