Even now, Carolyn DiFabrizio still can’t believe the man she knew best as a customer at Steak ‘Em Up—the South Philadelphia sandwich shop where she works—really came through.
“He had so many chances to back out,” Carolyn explains. “I kept saying to my boyfriend, ‘It’s too much. George isn’t going to do this.’”
But George Johnson wasn’t going to turn his back on his promise. He was determined to give Carolyn his kidney.
In fact, he had decided to do so the moment he had learned she needed one: when he had gone into Steak ‘Em Up for his morning coffee and handed Carolyn a bottle of creamer she had requested. He had asked, “Is there anything else I can do for you?” and she had replied, half-jokingly, “Well, you can give me a kidney.”
That was all George needed to hear. The South Philadelphia native, who has lived within six blocks of South 11th Street for his entire life, and is a regular customer at the neighborhood sandwich shop, immediately sprang into action. “I said, ‘Give me the phone number I need, and I’ll go get tested,’” George recalls.
Within a week, the blood test results came back—George was a match—and the two found out they were compatible for a donation within a few months. The two began preparing for their procedures, which would be performed by the kidney transplant team at Temple Health - Main Campus.
Why Choose Altruistic Kidney Donation?
The one question everyone asks when they hear about Carolyn and George’s story—after they’ve been assured that the transplant went well—is Why? Why would someone volunteer to donate their kidney to a woman who was little more than an acquaintance, just because she asked?
It’s a question that Carolyn has run over a million times in her mind. “I didn’t really know George,” she says. “We weren’t friends. My daughter hung out with him during COVID, and I knew my son had worked with him, but I didn’t. He’s always been a very outgoing, ‘If you need something, I’ll do it,’ kind of guy, but I only knew him from talking to him a bit at Steak ‘Em Up.”
In other words, there’s no secret connection between Carolyn and George that explains why he volunteered for the donation. Even George himself can’t quite put his finger on why he said yes. “I actually don’t know why I did it,” he says.
But this wasn’t the first time George had thought about being a donor. Years ago, a young relative had needed bone marrow, and George and his brother-in-law had gotten tested. Unfortunately, he hadn’t been a match, but the experience had stuck with him.
George’s sense of empathy, and familiarity with Carolyn’s family, were also part of his motivation. “There was a look of sadness on her face, and in the way she was acting,” he remembers from that moment in Steak ‘Em Up. “She wasn’t herself—she just looked like she had no hope left. I knew her son had just passed, and I figured it would be nice to give her a little bit of hope.”
Carolyn’s son, who George had known, passed away in October 2021. It was part of a series of events that led to Carolyn’s need for a transplant: she contracted COVID-19 shortly after his death, and spent three months in the hospital, experiencing kidney failure, congestive heart failure, pancreatitis, cellulitis, and a blood clot on her spleen. After being discharged, she was diagnosed with Stage IV and then Stage V kidney disease, put on peritoneal dialysis, and told she would require a kidney transplant.
But before Carolyn’s name had even been added to the national list of prospective transplant recipients, George stepped in as a donor, and was approved as a match. “When I found out, I was just like ‘Is this real? Could this be real?’” Carolyn recalls. “I never thought it would happen to me.”
Not Giving Up
Even after George was found to be a match and the surgeries were scheduled, there was still one last hurdle the pair had to overcome. Originally, the procedures were to take place on November 20, 2023, but Carolyn came down with a virus, and they had to be postponed.
“I told my boyfriend, ‘See, I’m not meant to have this. It’s too much of a gift for me,’” Carolyn remembers. “I thought, ‘Now George really isn’t going to do this.’”
But a rescheduled surgery date wasn’t going to deter George. He’d stuck with Carolyn through round after round of testing, and was fully committed to following through with this gift of life. In other words, there was no way he was going to give up—and he didn’t.
The surgeries were rescheduled for December 20, with Kenneth Chavin, MD, MBA, PhD, FACS, Director of Temple University Hospital’s Abdominal Organ Transplant Program, performing George’s procedure, and Antonio Di Carlo, MD, CM, FACS, FRCSC, Surgical Director of Kidney, Liver and Pancreas Transplantation, and Living Donation at Temple University Hospital, performing Carolyn’s. Both surgeries were successful, and Carolyn and George are continuing to recover well.
“I hope and pray each day that this kidney works,” Carolyn says. “So far, so good.” She’s already off her blood pressure medications, and Meredith Behr, MMS, PA-C, a Physician Assistant in Transplant Surgery, says she’s been “a champ.” George is also doing great, and continuing to impress everyone around him.
“He’s like the poster child for kindness and generosity,” says John Mulligan, MSN, RN, CCTC, Temple’s Kidney Transplant Coordinator. “There’s a lot of testing required to plan this type of surgery. George was happy to do it, and he came to each appointment with a smile. It actually took me a long time to realize that he and Carolyn had such a casual relationship, because of how willing he was to go out of his way for her.”
One Donor Changes a Life
It’s that generosity that has transformed George and Carolyn’s relationship from employee and sandwich shop regular to something like family. “He’s my brother now,” Carolyn says. “We try to text or talk at least once a day. His dad and grandmom were like, ‘I guess that’s your new sister.’”
“Every time I see Carolyn, she won’t stop thanking me,” George laughs. “I keep telling her to stop. There isn’t any reason to say thank you. I just feel like I did the right thing for someone who really needed it and deserved it.”
That, more than anything, is what George hopes people take away from his experience. “I want anyone who reads this to know that you can donate, and there’s a manageable recovery period, and that real good comes out of it,” he says. “It makes you feel like a good person—and if you’re already a good person, it makes you feel even better.”
According to Behr, Good Samaritans like George aren’t as rare as one might think. “We actually see a lot of them,” she explains. “That’s why I tell patients to always be honest when someone asks them how they’re doing. Don’t say, ‘I’m great.’ Tell them, ‘Dialysis is beating me up. I need a kidney.’ You never know who will hear that and offer to donate. There are so many people out there who want to do good.”
“Out of everyone in the world, what were the odds that it was a man coming in for coffee who would be the one to say yes?” Carolyn asks. “And then that he’d be the one to follow through, and be the one who I’d match with? My boyfriend wasn’t a match. My parents weren’t a match. My sister and brother and daughter weren’t a match. But George was. And that’s why I say he’s my angel on earth.”
