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July 18, 2009

Bond of a lifetime as donor and recipient meet

By Pete Chiodo

Meadville Tribune

Even at a young age, Meadville’s Julia Pless understood the art of the deal; like, for instance, asking her parents for something at a time when there was no conceivable way they were going to say no.

This happened back when Pless was 7 years old. Stuck in a hospital room, weak from chemotherapy and awaiting a life-saving transfusion of bone marrow, young Julia seized her opportunity.

“‘When I’m all better, can we ...,’” her dad, Dr. Peter Pless, mimics. “What was the bargain?”

“Well, it wasn’t really a bargain,” Julia answers. “It was like ...”

“You get a transplant, you get a dog,” interrupts Julia’s 17-year-old sister Victoria.

“Oh ... yeah,” says Julia, surrendering.

It’s been five years since that deal went down. And now there’s Miley, Julia’s Bichon Frise, resting its little head on Julia’s lap while Julia runs her hands through the dog’s soft white fur.

Beside the girl and her dog sits the reason for Miley and, really, the reason for Julia as she is today.

That person is Lynette Truelsen. Truelsen is in Meadville this weekend, celebrating Julia’s 13th birthday.

However, Truelsen already gave Julia her present five years ago — a big one too.

It started with a phone call one day in November of 2003.

“They said, ‘You’re a possible match, are you still interested?’ ”

Years before, Truelsen, a nurse practitioner from Billings, Mont., registered with the Bone Marrow Registry during a drive for a sick girl in Montana.

Truelsen wasn’t a match then. Little did she know a chance to save a life still lay in her future.

“They don’t tell you who (the donation) is going to,” Truelsen said. “All I knew is that she was 7 and that she had this disease.”

That girl, of course, was Julia Pless, who in July of that year was diagnosed with Fanconi anemia, a genetic disease that, in her case, was causing her bone marrow to fail.

“She was at complete bone marrow failure,” said Julia’s mother, Janice. “So she had to have a bone marrow transplant as soon as possible. It was life or death.”

Julia’s family members couldn’t provide a suitable genetic match for a transplant. And although hundreds of Meadville residents turned out for bone marrow drive, that search didn’t yield a match either.

However, the Bone Marrow Registry, found a lifeline in Truelsen.

“Her DNA matched Julia’s enough that they could do a transplant, which is, you know, a miracle,” Janice Pless said. “A one-in-a-million chance.”

Truelsen’s marrow was transplanted to Julia in April of 2004 in Minneapolis. A few months later, she was back home in Meadville and getting stronger every day.

“After a year,” said Janice Pless, “the Bone Marrow Registry sent out letters. They ask the donor and the recipient if they want to have contact with each other. We said yes. It took a few years, but we talked and we e-mailed.”

“Christmas gifts and stuff like that,” said Peter Pless.

“And on the anniversary date this year, they asked if I was interested in coming out because it was five years,” Truelsen said.

She jumped at the chance.

“Totally,” she said.

Now here they are, side-by-side, finally together in person, years after sharing one incredible gift.

Well, not exactly side-by-side. Not with Miley wedged between them.

“But we didn’t name her after Miley Cyrus,” Julia insists. “I don’t like her very much.

“That’s the thing I asked when I saw the dog,” said Truelsen. “You don’t like country music either, huh?”



Pete Chiodo can be reached at 724-6370 ext. 275 or by e-mail at pchiodo@meadvilletribune.com.

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