The last time Joy Salvatore met the man who would give her a lifesaving gift at Methodist Dallas Medical Center, he was just a teenager working with her partner at a pool store.
“We didn’t recognize him because now he’s a grown man with a business of his own,” Joy recalls from a chance meeting with Zac at a local hardware store in 2024. “He found out I needed a kidney, and he said, ‘I’ll give her one.’”
She was skeptical, but Zac followed through when he turned out to be a perfect match. Both traveled 100 miles from the Waco area to Methodist Dallas for the transplant surgery in February 2025.
“Joy is a grandmother, and I didn’t have a lot of time with my own grandparents,” says Zac, a generous but humble man who asked that his last name be withheld. “If I was able to give her more time with her grandchildren, then I wanted to do that.”
Just a few months after surgery, Zac is feeling completely healthy, and so does Joy, She considers their neighbor across the lake a godsend, as does Sharon Kerr, her spouse.
“Zac is a gift,” says Sharon, who lives with Joy in McLennan County. “He was just a gift from God.”
Thanks to a friend’s generosity, Joy and Sharon can spend more time with each other and the grandkids.
‘I DIDN’T FEEL SICK’
It was 2011 when Joy was diagnosed with kidney disease after some bloodwork during a routine exam.
“I would have never known if not for that yearly checkup,” she says. “I didn’t feel sick, and I’m in good shape otherwise, for having just turned 65.”
But her glomerular filtration rate (GFR) numbers told a different story, and Joy immediately went on a nutrition plan that was low in sodium, potassium, and protein to go easy on her failing kidneys.
“I think that’s what kept me holding on for so long,” Joy says of her strict kidney diet. “By then, I was moping around half-dead.”
It became clear that Joy would need dialysis before much longer, and she was added to a transplant list in 2024. Her kidney doctor referred her to The Transplant Institute at Methodist Dallas.
“It was between Dallas and San Antonio, and I was very impressed with Dallas,” says Joy, who lives just outside Waco.
Zac was moved to tears by a card from Joy, Sharon, and their grandchildren.
LIVING DONOR
Joy would end up in the care of Alejandro Mejia, MD, executive director of organ transplantation at Methodist Dallas, and Christie Gooden, MD, his fellow transplant surgeon on the medical staff.
Dr. Gooden says Joy was fortunate that Zac stepped up when he did, or she would have needed to start lifesaving dialysis treatment while she waited five or six years for a transplant.
“It’s so difficult to find a deceased donor in a short amount of time for Joy’s blood type,” she says. “For patients like her who don’t want to start dialysis, having a living donor may be the only option.”
Many potential donors may not realize that donating a kidney doesn’t have to compromise their health moving forward. In Zac’s case, he’s feeling as healthy as ever just a few months after giving up one of his kidneys.
“I feel entirely normal,” Zac says, “and I would reassure anyone thinking about doing this that the whole process of kidney donation isn’t very difficult.”
Dr. Gooden agrees, noting that she’s had kidney donors who gave birth later on or even ran marathons with just one kidney and no ill effects.
“What’s really important to remember is that we’re not going to hurt someone to help somebody else,” Dr. Gooden says. “The other thing I tell people all the time is that you should live your life so that if you ever needed a kidney, somebody would return the kindness they remember you for.”
Joy and Sharon consider Zac “a gift from God” and his donation a new lease on life.
PERFECT TIMING
Fortunately for Joy, who found no matches within her immediate family, Zac remembered her and Sharon for their kindness almost a decade ago, when he was just 17 and he worked with Sharon.
But he’s not the only one who has paid Joy back: She credits “God, Zac, and Deszarai,” her daughter-in-law who was there for every trip to Methodist Dallas, even “sleeping in the window of the ICU.”
Joy also praised the hospital’s clinical staff, who she says made her transplant as smooth as it could be.
“All the nurses and doctors were so good to me,” says Joy, who worked as a caregiving herself for over a decade. “Even the lab department was excellent.”
Three days after her February surgery, Joy was discharged back home to recover with Sharon and their beloved dog Roxy. Not long afterward, she reunited with Zac to give him a card signed by her whole family, those grandchildren included.
“I gave him a hug, and he just started to cry,” Joy remembers. “He’s a deeper person than your usual character. I’m living proof of that.”
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