Maddie Sabourin, 18, has been a Miss Georgia Outstanding Teen Pageant contestant for the past two years. Her pageant platform is organ donation awareness.
Sabourin has specifically supported the American Kidney Fund through fundraising and awareness. In 2016, she hosted an event called Performance for a Purpose, which raised over $7,000 for the organization.
Organ donation wasn’t only a platform for pageants but a personal passion born out of a loved one’s fight for his life. Her grandpa, Sam Senseney, has kidney disease.
His name sat on the transplant list for six years. The four-hour-long dialysis treatments three times a week have been exhausting for Senseney, but they’ve also taken an emotional toll on his granddaughter.
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Sabourin told WGCL, “Watching papa just be on the transplant list for the past six years has been super hard. We’ve always been really close.”
Their bond has become even closer. Sabourin had a gift that no other family member could give Senseney.
She presented him with a piece of paper representing this life-saving gift. The heading read: “It’s moving day!!”
It cleverly continued, “Kidney’s Old Address: Madeline Sabourin 18 yrs old, O- blood type. Kidney’s New Address: Sammy Senseney 63 yrs old, O+ blood type.”
Sabourin wasted no time after turning 18 to find out if she was a match. She spent years praying for her sick grandpa and knew it was in God’s plan for her to help save his life.
Even with her faith in God’s plan and timing, it wasn’t a seamless journey. Doctors believed she might have been too young to donate, but she didn’t “let it go,” according to WGCL.
She wrote on Facebook, “watching my best buddy suffer for the past six years on the transplant list really takes a toll on a girl. God is the coolest in making us a perfect match and I’ve been holding this in for FOUR MONTHS!!”
Sabourin has done amazing work for the American Kidney Fund through raising both awareness and money. However, the generosity didn’t stop there as she prepares to donate her own kidney to her beloved grandpa.
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