QB Thanks Donor Who Changed 35 Lives

Sept. 15, 2006 — -- Julie De Rossi, 44, lived life to the fullest: She loved to race cars and scuba dive, and was fiercely protective of her family, especially her son, Aaron Hehr. While her all-or-nothing attitude could, at times, drive them crazy, her family adored her.

"There were times when I loved her to death," says Hehr, now 26, "and there were times I had to remind myself I loved her to death."

Hehr was the last person to see his mother alive. Two years ago, on her way home from her job as a music promoter, she stopped at his house to bring him orange juice because he wasn't feeling well.

After she left, she was hit by a drunk driver going more than 100 miles per hour. The other driver was uninjured. She was rushed to a hospital in Houston.

"It was like 4:15 in the morning," when the hospital called, said De Rossi's mother, Dorothy Hyde. "You know it's bad news."

De Rossi's mother, sister and son gathered around her bedside to say their goodbyes. She never regained consciousness. The family knew she wanted to be an organ donor.

"When a spirit and soul dies, and all that's left is the body," explained De Rossi's mom, "it's a crime to waste all the body that's left. The donor doesn't need it anymore."

To date, that decision to donate organs and tissue has changed the lives of 35 people, including NFL quarterback Carson Palmer, whose knee was rebuilt using De Rossi's Achilles tendon more two years after her death.

Watch a full report on Julie De Rossi's organ and tissue donation gift Sunday on "World News."

De Rossi's family knows she would have approved. Her mom was confident. "She was probably up there watching and saying, 'OK, go for it."

De Rossi's organs were immediately harvested. That's when Paul Ehlinger, 59, got the call.

"Paul picked up the phone," said Vivian, his wife of 38 years. "We think we have a liver for you, and you need to be at the hospital within an hour," the caller said.

Ehlinger quickly gathered his things. He had been on and off the transplant waiting list for a donated liver for years after suffering from hepatitis and liver cancer. This was his last chance at survival.

"It was unfortunate someone else's life ended to give me a new liver," Ehlinger said. "I'm more than grateful for that."

Ehlinger is a father and a grandfather, and his wife is thrilled "he'll be here to see his grandchildren, which otherwise would not have been possible."

Unlike organs, which must be used immediately after death, some tissue can be taken and frozen.

"Organ donation is a great thing: It saves people's lives," said Mike Nickel with Lifegift, an organ donation center. "But the other side, though, is tissue. Most people don't realize they can donate the bones in their bodies. … Everyone is potentially a tissue donor."

Almost two years after De Rossi died, Palmer was in a playoff game for the Cincinnati Bengals against the Pittsburgh Steelers. During his first pass of the game, he was tackled to the ground and tore his knee's two main ligaments.

"People said it was a career-ending injury," Palmer says. "People said I wasn't gonna be the same. I took all the naysayers and the doubters inside, and I used that as my fuel to get through it."

This weekend, Palmer takes the field at the Bengals season opener. His amazing recovery would not have been possible without the help of De Rossi and her achilles tendon.

Palmer admits, "It's a very eerie feeling to think that someone else's body part can be used to reconstruct one of your body parts."

De Rossi's family thinks it's only appropriate that their daredevil, adventure-loving Julie lives on in the spirit of a football player.

"I'm looking forward to seeing her in the Super Bowl," jokes De Rossi's sister, Karen Abercrombie.

They admit De Rossi would not have known who Carson Palmer was if she bumped into him on the street. But now they've become big Bengals fans and are very protective of Palmer and his knee.

"We feel like we know who he is," said Abercrombie. "We have a great respect for him and are glad he's back on his feet. We're going to be cheering him on. He's got some good support there, some good stalk."

De Rossi's family believes her legacy -- the lives she has saved -- makes her death easier to bear.

"Just the fact she was a donor is a keystone to how she lived her life." said De Rossi's son, Aaron Hehr, choking back the tears. "I hope to be half the person she was."

"Certainly, her organs were absolutely lifesaving," Nickel said. "But I would argue … a tissue transplant is also lifesaving. Carson's life is football. This surgery that he got with her [De Rossi's] Achilles heel gave him his life back."

Palmer knows he has a second chance at football because of Julie De Rossi's gift.

"It's not something you think about," Palmer said, "until you're actually affected by it or something within your family around you is affected by it."

It's a gift he hopes to pass on one day, because he, too, now has become an organ donor.