Bride who had a life-saving organ transplant is walked down the aisle by the father of the donor who lost his life in a crash days before her own wedding
Daniel Donnelly Jr.’s dream of watching his daughter, Heather, walk down the aisle never came to pass. But earlier this year, he got a special opportunity to experience what it would have been like when Diana Donnarumma asked him to walk her halfway down the aisle on her big day.
“I try to carry on her spirit the best I can every day,” said Donnarumma, who is one of eight people that received an organ transplant from Heather after she lost her life in a 2017 car accident in Texas just three days before her own wedding. “And I felt like I needed to–but also I wanted to–give her father the opportunity,” she added according to The Buffalo News.
This is the tearjerking moment a bride whose life was saved by an organ donation was walked down the aisle at her wedding by her donor’s father.
Diana Donnarumma, 28, from Buffalo, New York, fought back tears as Daniel Donnelly Jr held her hand as they walked into the reception so she could marry her fiance, Conlan Kreher.
But before getting to the altar, Daniel, whose donor daughter Heather lost her life in a car accident in 2017, passed Diana back to her own father, who thanked him for his daughter’s gift.
An intestinal transplant from Heather had helped save Diana’s life, as she was previously in intestinal failure due to the progression of her Dysautonomia, also known as automatic dysfunction.
A year after the transplant, Diana was allowed to reach out to her donor’s family, who are given the option to either accept or deny the request.
Diana’s letter went through her transplant center in Washington DC to a Texas organ donation center, which then contacted Daniel.
Daniel accepted the letter, and he and Diana later spoke by phone, which, Diana said, caused her to cry for two days straight, having discovered what a wonderful person Heather was.
In the years since, Diana has tried to raise awareness of Heather’s life and organ donation through her social media pages, and she and Daniel eventually met in Illinois, where Daniel lives.
There, he told Diana that it was Heather’s decision to donate, and how his daughter had passed away just a few days before she was due to marry her own fiancé, Beau.
Knowing that Daniel, a single parent, had not had the chance to walk his daughter down the aisle on her big day, Diana later asked if he would do her the honor, which Daniel accepted.
On August 13, at Salvatore Hospitality in Buffalo, Daniel cried as he first saw Diana in her wedding dress, before walking her into the main room for the reception.
There, he gave Diana over to her biological father, Glen, who walked his daughter the rest of the way so that she could marry her husband, Conlan Kreher, 30.
Source: daily.lessonslearnedinlife.com, dailymail.co.uk
