\nWhen Brian Burkett found out he needed a liver transplant, he thought it might take some time to find a donor. But after sending out an email to his coworkers, he found he received a response almost immediately from Mike Snyder.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u0153He called me within five minutes,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Burkett recalled. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153You\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re just like \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcWhat? Thank you!’\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\n<\/p>\n
\nBurkett had been diagnosed with cirrhosis of the liver years earlier and suffered from chronic fatigue before the operation.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u0153It was awful,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Burkett told ABC News. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Sometimes you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re so tired you can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t sleep. I couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t even do simple activities.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\n<\/p>\n
\nSnyder met Burkett seven years earlier while working for ATT in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. He said when he learned his coworker needed help, he had no doubts about signing up to be a living donor, meaning a portion of his liver would be used to replace Burkett\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s liver.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Absolutely we had no doubts, my wife was 100 percent supportive,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d said Snyder. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153They called me in and it was pretty rigorous process\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\n<\/p>\n
\nDoctors found that Snyder was a good candidate for the transplant, but there was one major problem: Snyder had fatty liver disease, and in order to be a possible donor, he needed to lose weight \u00e2\u20ac\u201d a lot of weight.\n<\/p>\n
\nBut Snyder, an army veteran who served two tours in Iraq, didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t even hesitate, immediately falling back on his military training to get back in shape. He worked out for an hour in the morning and an hour at night, and gave up nearly all carbohydrates.\n<\/p>\n
\nSnyder ended up dropping about 25 pounds in just three weeks.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u0153It was really not an issue,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d said Snyder. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I went back to eating right and exercising. I mainly stuck to cardio.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\n<\/p>\n
\nThe pair of coworkers underwent transplant surgery last September. Snyder woke up first from his eight-hour donor surgery. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153When I woke up I was asking about Brain,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d said Snyder. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153He was in surgery for another two hours after I got out.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\n<\/p>\n
\nBurkett said that after waking up from the transplant he could immediately feel a difference. His chronic fatigue was gone and he felt better than he had in years.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u0153You wake up and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s gone. It was amazing how well it felt,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d said Burkett.\n<\/p>\n
\nNow, months after the surgery, both men are back at work. But they both say the experience of going through the transplant has made them much closer friends.\n<\/p>\n
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u0153The difference is before we were coworkers and friends, after we have a different kind of connection that honestly is more like family,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d said Burkett.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
When Brian Burkett found out he needed a liver transplant, he thought it might take some time to find a donor. But after sending out an email to his coworkers, he found he received a response almost immediately from Mike Snyder. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153He called me within five minutes,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Burkett recalled. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153You\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re just like \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcWhat? Thank you!’\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-70355","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/healthmedicinet.com\/i\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70355","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/healthmedicinet.com\/i\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/healthmedicinet.com\/i\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/healthmedicinet.com\/i\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/healthmedicinet.com\/i\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=70355"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/healthmedicinet.com\/i\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70355\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/healthmedicinet.com\/i\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=70355"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/healthmedicinet.com\/i\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=70355"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/healthmedicinet.com\/i\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=70355"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}