My daughter is always in my heart...literally

Jeanne and Chester Szuber’s daughter Patti died tragically and ended up saving her father’s life.

As Chester Szuber’s heart beats, he knows how lucky he is. The heart that pulses inside his chest is like no other in the entire human race – it once belonged to his daughter Patti. Seventeen years ago, Chester, known as Chet, was close to death. After three major heart operations, even bending over to wash his face left him exhausted. He and his six children started to come to terms with the fact he might not have long to live.

But it took great tragedy – the loss of his beloved youngest daughter – to save his life. “My daughter died so that I could live, and I can never forget that,” says Chet, tearfully. “She’s in my thoughts and in my heart every single day of my life. It doesn’t matter if it is 17 days, 17 months, or 17 years since she’s gone. Every heartbeat reminds me she gave me the gift of life.” When nursing student Patti was just 22, in August 1994, she went on a camping holiday with a friend. As they were driving home, their car swerved off the road. Patti was flung from the car and suffered massive head injuries.

Chet and his wife Jeanne flew to her hospital bedside and, with their five other children, waited as Patti fought for her life. But she lost her battle, and doctors declared her clinically brain-dead. “It was the most heartbreaking moment of my life,” says Chet. Then something extraordinary happened. While Chet was sitting grief-stricken in the hospital, a doctor informed him that Patti had opted to donate all her organs and, he added, “You have first pick of her heart.”

At first Chet refused. “Parents aren’t supposed to bury their kids, let alone take their damned organs,” he says. But then he started to think about what his beloved Patti would have wanted. “I could hear Patti’s voice in my mind. She was saying, ‘Go on, Dad. Take it. Take the chance to live again.’” Along with Jeanne and his surviving children, he made the decision to take Patti’s heart. Just five hours after it was removed from Patti, it was put into her dad’s chest and used to save his life.