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A heartwarming celebration unfolded in Hoffman Estates as a local educator and her students embraced a new beginning.
Katie Pappas was welcomed with open arms into a fresh chapter, a story she once feared she might never share.
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Six months ago, ABC7 Chicago chronicled Pappas’ journey when she discovered her kidneys had failed once more, nearly a decade after her initial transplant.
“They told me, ‘Given everything your body has endured… you don’t have seven years to wait for another transplant. You need a living donor,'” Pappas recalled.
On Wednesday, ABC7 introduced the world to what they called Katie 3.0.
After months grueling through dialysis, the beloved District U-46 teacher’s community desperately rallied for help. She got the call she’d been waiting for.
“[A] person who is a stranger to me and was deemed a wonderful candidate, just not for me, agreed to give their kidney to anyone so I would get one in return,” Pappas said.
The anonymous donor agreed to be part of a swap program to save her life and others. Last Thursday, on a red-eye flight from California, Pappas’ living donor kidney arrived, and so did her third chance at life.
On Wednesday, she celebrated her first week in her new life, surrounded by family, friends and current and former students
“I was crying when I first found that out, because I was just so happy that she gets a third chance on life,” former student Janice Poe said.
READ MORE | Beloved Hoffman Estates teacher in desperate need of 2nd kidney transplant: ‘I want to be here’
“Even when she had her hardest days, she always had a smile on her face,” Timber Trails Elementary School student Liana Kolovos said.
The Timber Trails Elementary School teacher also being celebrated for yet another contribution to her district: naming U-46’s newest school in Elgin.
Katie, with the help of her students, submitted the name Legacy Middle School just weeks before her transplant surgery.
“It’s an invitation for every kid that walks in the building to challenge themselves,” Pappas said. “What is your legacy going to be? What are you going to leave behind?”
Appropriate for the teacher who, already, through her fight to live has created a legacy herself, one she says she owes to the anonymous generosity of strangers.
“To everyone involved, thank you isn’t enough,” Pappas said. “And I plan on living the rest of my life like my donors watching, like all of them are watching. And I’m not going to let them down.”
