Feel Good

Two strangers are brought together in Jacksonville through fate and a rare disease

This time, every year, you can find David Moore, a New Jersey native, in Jacksonville.

“We celebrate with each other.” Ginger Brewer said.

Both Moore and Ginger Brewer—who lives here---have their annual “liver transplant anniversary” to remember the day they received new organs and a fresh take on life.

“We’re like brothers and sisters.” Moore said. “Not the fighting kind.”

Moore and Brewer were both diagnosed in 2008 with Wilson’s disease, a rare liver condition. Brewer got her transplant in 2010 at the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville. She got the call at one in the morning on October 2, 2010. Brewer did not know Moore at this time. It was not until Brewer’s son, Mike, had moved to New Jersey that he and Moore happened to meet at a church.

“He goes ‘wait you’re on the transplant list?’ I said, 'Yeah, I have a rare genetic liver disease.” Moore said, recounting the interaction. “And he goes, ‘No way, I just walked my mom through a liver transplant.’”

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Mike called his mother and told her the news. “I could almost feel myself panicking.” Brewer said. “I knew that it was a lot harder for someone to get a liver up there [New Jersey].”

The Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville has one of the shortest wait times in the entire country. Each year, Mayo treats nearly 25,000 people with liver disorders, and Moore would be no different.

Sooner after that call, Brewer convinced Moore to temporarily move to Jacksonville and seek treatment at Mayo. The two had never met each other in person, but Moore trusted her.

Not long after his first consult, Moore got the call that he could be receiving a new liver. It was on October 2, 2014.

“She gave me a hug and she goes, ‘Happy liver-versary.’” Moore said.

Now, the two are healthy and happy. Despite not knowing each other before all of this, and only seeing each other once a year, the two feel they were meant to be in each other’s lives.