By Janet Flanagan
Tom Hildebrand is “eternally grateful” for people who donate blood. He’s alive today because of them and will soon mark his 15th anniversary of escaping death.
The life-changing event of this 72-year-old North Sioux City, South Dakota, resident happened on August 30, 2009. Then at age 57 and working in Mitchell, South Dakota, Hildebrand was renting a lake house north of town. He went to bed early because of a meeting the next day but woke in the middle of the night with “excruciating pain that came out of nowhere.” Fumbling with his flip phone, he managed to call 911. A Mitchell rescue crew raced him to nearby Queen of Peace Hospital. There, an ultrasound revealed an abdominal aortic aneurysm that ruptured, causing life-threatening bleeding.
Suddenly a middle-of-the-night emergency turned critical.
The Avera Health helicopter arrived. During the flight back to its Sioux Falls heart hospital workers “loaded me up with five units of blood,” says Hildebrand. “When I landed, my blood pressure was 50 over 0. My surgeon said when he opened me up, I had two minutes left. And that,” he says,” is when I became a lifetime member of the ‘blood bank society.’
Unfortunately, complications from his blood loss followed Hildebrand’s 13-hour surgery in Sioux Falls: septic shock, multiple organ failure, an amputation of his left leg and more. “I came back from all of that,” he says. Four months later he went home.
“I’ll never forget the flight nurse in the helicopter that night,” Hildebrand says. “She was yelling at me. When we met at a reunion later, she told me she was actually screaming at me, ‘Stay with us. Stay with us.’”
Hildebrand has never forgotten that nurse or all the people who helped save his life; and he’s always remembered the role that donated blood played, first on the flight to the Sioux Falls hospital and then in the 13-hour surgery. He’s written a book, shared his story with clubs and non-profits in the South Dakota area, and has been featured in Avera TV commercials.
“My ‘event’ created a debt to society which I can never repay,” Hildebrand says. “God has my attention now. I know I can never repay this debt, but I can help others. I can tell this story to anyone who’ll listen and by example, advocate for causes that help others, particularly those who operate in anonymity.”
Last June, when he was volunteering at the Sioux City Senior Center, Tom spotted an American Red Cross employee loading up supplies following a blood drive there. “Instead of walking by and saying nothing,” he says, “I felt compelled to stop and say, ‘thank you,’ briefly telling my story and mentioning my willingness to help the Red Cross.
“I give thanks every day to God and look forward to any opportunity to help someone else,” Hildebrand adds. “I’m eternally grateful.”
Unable to return to his banking career, today Tom volunteers with the SHIIP and SHIINE programs that educate seniors on Medicare in Iowa and South Dakota. He can ride a bicycle, golf, do yard work and most normal household maintenance.
He can be a champion for blood donations, too.
“Donating blood is a chance to be a hero,” Hildebrand says. “Each and every time a person donates blood, it can be lifesaving. I have a bunch of people who are my heroes. Because of them, here I am.”