Marissa Auerbach, 14, received the heart of Hector Lucero’s daughter in a transplant.

Marissa Auerbach, 14, received the heart of Hector Lucero’s daughter in a transplant. (Globe Staff Photo / John Bohn)

Gift of heart draws two families close

By Michael Levenson, Globe Correspondent | November 8, 2004

Marissa Auerbach limbered up at the start of the road race yesterday, looking like just another 14-year-old in an oversize T-shirt and baggy sweatpants.

Behind her were her father, mother, and two younger sisters.

As she waited at the starting line on the brilliant autumn day, her nervousness had little to do with the hilly course ahead. This was the third annual Dr. Cynthia Lucero Memorial Run and Walk. Marissa, a ninth-grader at Sharon High School, had received Lucero's heart two years ago, after the 28-year-old psychologist collapsed and died while running the Boston Marathon.

The donation extended Marissa's life and gave Lucero's family some solace as well as hope.

Three weeks ago, both families made the highly unusual decision to meet each other. Only about 10 percent of organ recipients ever meet the families of their donors, according to the New England Organ Bank.

The decision was initiated by a letter Marissa sent to the then-unknown donor family in the weeks after her transplant at Children's Hospital in Boston. Marissa said she wanted simply to say, "I'm grateful."

The Auerbachs waved off a doctor's recommendation that they be accompanied by a social worker, who was concerned that donor families sometimes become overly attached to the recipients.

Lucero collapsed while running between miles 19 and 20 of the 2002 Boston Marathon. She died of hyponatremia, a critical imbalance of sodium in the blood brought on in part by drinking too much fluid. (She had become what some refer to as overhydrated.)

Lucero, an experienced athlete who was running to raise money for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society and had written her dissertation on how running can help families cope with grief, was adamant about being an organ donor.

Last month, Lucero's parents, Martha and Hector, flew from their home in Guayaquil, Ecuador, to meet Marissa at the New England Organ Bank in Newton. "I was really nervous," Marissa said. "I didn't know what to expect."

When they met, Hector Lucero threw his arms around Marissa, and the two families spent hours together, crying, hugging, and sharing life stories.

They lingered so long -- up to the donor bank's closing time -- that staff members had to ask them to leave.

Marissa had learned about Cynthia Lucero through news stories and was moved to hear more from her parents. "I just thought she was a really great person, and she liked helping people," Marissa said.

The Luceros were moved, too, to share another family's joy sprung from their daughter's donation.

"It gave her life," Hector Lucero said. "And that somehow helps heal our hearts."

Before the heart transplant, Marissa's life had been in peril.

As a baby, she was diagnosed with cardiomyopathy, a disorder that causes muscle and tissue damage in the heart.

Growing up, she had watched her friends play soccer and softball. Even brief walks made her short of breath.

Two years ago, her condition worsened. She waited for a heart for eight weeks -- three of them in a bed at Children's Hospital. She kept a web log during the day, and her father grew a long beard, refusing to shave until a transplant was performed.

Then on April 17, the night Cynthia Lucero died, the Auerbachs learned about a heart donation, one of similar size and a matching blood type. Victor Auerbach informed his daughter that he would shave that morning. He was overjoyed.

"I felt like I was having another baby," he said.

Marissa now marks her life on two distinct days on the calendar. "I like to think I have two birthdays -- the day I was born, July 4th, and April 17th."

At the race yesterday, both families came together for the second time. Marissa hugged the Luceros. Both sets of parents walked part of the course together, chatting about their children.

Afterward, Marissa was introduced to the runners, who gasped to learn that she had Cynthia Lucero's heart. Marissa smiled and waved.

It was not always an easy day for the Luceros. Marissa's vitality is at once a painful reminder of their daughter's death as well as a joyous testament to her life.

In biological terms, the heart may be not much different from the liver, which Cynthia Lucero also donated, but it carries a symbolic meaning that is important to the family, said Alexandra Stirling, 35, Cynthia Lucero's older sister.

"It's the center of your being, and it's very special," she said. "I kind of think she got the best part of everybody else that got my sister's organs."

The race yesterday finished where it started, on the leafy grounds of the Massachusetts School of Professional Psychology in West Roxbury, where Cynthia Lucero received her doctorate shortly before she died.

The last time Hector Lucero was at the school, he was photographing his daughter there. Yesterday, Marissa walked most of the race and sprinted the last steps with her father. A budding athlete, she had medical clearance to play field hockey this summer and joined the track team at Sharon High.

After the race, Hector Lucero wiped away his tears. He is working to continue his daughter's legacy by raising awareness of organ donation in Ecuador and starting a scholarship at her college there.

As he spoke, he watched Marissa play with her sisters, Sarah, 11, and Emily, 5. He said her life gives him hope in that mission.

"It is not only the recipient who gets the benefit of life, but the whole family," he said.

"And that makes me think that Cynthia's passing was not for nothing."