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Payton Herres is only alive today thanks to the generosity of an organ donor and his family, who gave her his heart 12 years ago.
The 25-year-old, from Dayton, Ohio, was born with a rare congenital heart disease, Ebstein’s anomaly, which affects the tricuspid valve on the right side of the heart. The condition, which causes blood to leak backward into the right atrium — upper right chamber — of the heart, can lead to heart failure.
When she was 11 years old, following years of health problems, Herres was left with no choice but to undergo a heart transplant in March 2012.
The surgery was successful; the recovery long and often painful, but Herres credits her donor for giving her a “second chance” at life.
Since the surgery,
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