Organ donation is a wonderful selfless thing to do to save lives, but don’t count on it to save your marriage. Long Island doctor Richard Batista just learned this painful lesson the hard way.
Out of miraculous odds of 1 in 700,000, Dr. Batista found that he was a match to donate one of his kidneys to his wife. At the time of the transplant the couple had been married 11 years and had three daughters together; however, the couple’s relationship had become strained in recent years from the stress of Mrs. Batista’s kidney failure. In regard to his decision to donate his kidney to his wife, Dr. Batista has said, "My first priority was to save her life. The second bonus was to turn our marriage around."
Dr. Batista never got that “second bonus”. After the successful transplant, his wife felt as though she had a second chance at life. She decided to take karate lessons, which lead to an injury, which lead to physical therapy, which ultimately lead to an affair with her physical therapist. Only four years after the transplant, Mrs. Batista served her husband with divorce papers.
Now the doctor wants his kidney back – or at least $1.5 million in compensation. "It put a hole in my heart that still exists," Batista said of his wife's disloyalty. "To this day, I'm a man of pride. To be betrayed that way, humiliated - I can't even begin to say." In addition to his sense of betrayal over the kidney, Batista claims his wife has not allowed him to see his daughters in months.
Will his cash-for-kidney lawsuit be successful? Will a judge actually have to sign a divorce decree awarding custody of an internal organ? Tune in next week on [Grey’s Anatomy/House/fill-in-your-favorite-doctor-show]…
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