On Wednesday a North Texas family helped raise a flag over Baylor All Saints Medical Center in Fort Worth for National Donate Life Month. It's meant to raise awareness about the importance of organ donation. No one knows more about the impact it can have than Cassondra Singleton.
"He'd get that football and run," Singleton recalled about her son, Aaron.
Last November, the Joshua Owls played the Cleburne Yellow Jackets. Aaron Singleton took a hard hit on the football field and died. He was 15 years old.
"I'm really sad that Aaron's not here to goof around with," his mother said through tears. "It was just a freak accident."
Cassondra Singleton made the decision to donate her son's organs.
"It was really the only decision I would make," she explained. "He was perfectly healthy, so why not?"
Aaron's kidneys, liver, corneas, tissue, pancreas and heart all went to help others live.
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"I couldn't walk," said Mike Norton. "I could go maybe 40 to 50 feet, and I'd have to stop and rest."
Norton had a congenital heart defect that eventually put him on the transplant waiting list.
"I'm the fourth person in my family to have a heart transplant," he said.
Norton, a landscape photographer, has been unable to climb the peaks and valleys he photographs.
"I'm standing on the road," he said, pointing to a picture of Half Dome. "I would like to try to do that some day. If I get there, her son's heart took me there."
Norton got his heart from Aaron Singleton's gift. On Tuesday, Norton and two other recipients of Aaron's organ donations met the Singleton family.
And a mother got to hear her son's heart beat again.
"I'm so sorry for your loss, but so appreciative of your gift," Norton told Cassondra Singleton as the two embraced. "Everything I do for the rest of my life, Aaron's taking me there."
MORE: If you'd like to register as an organ donor, you can find more information here.
