Keren (19) and Tali (17) felt their mother’s heartbeat through Lital’s chest while Rabbi Leo Dee and his son Yehuda (14) stood by their side. Valenci expressed her condolences to the family on the loss of their wife and mother and shared how appreciative she was to both Lucy and the family for giving her a new lease on life. The Dee family spoke about their mother and Valenci shared that even after she passed, she continued to help others by helping five people, including herself. This is the first time the Dee family and Valenci met in person.

The emotional meeting took place today at Beilinson, one of Israel’s largest medical centers that specializes in transplants and conducts 70-percent of organ transplants in Israel. Beilinson’s team of world-renowned surgeons operated on Valenci during the early hours of April 11, and she has been recovering at the hospital.

“I was so moved when I learned who I was receiving a heart from as I had read about Lucy Dee and what an incredible woman she was with an exemplary family,” said Valenci.

“Listening to my mother’s heartbeat made me feel like I am with her. It was moving meeting Lital and all the recipients, we have lost so much but are comforted that so many families were saved from similar pain,” said Keren.

“Nobody can understand what it is like losing a mother and two sisters at once and to hear my mother’s heartbeat was comforting,” added Tali

“There was not a dry eye in the room as Keren and Tali raised their hands to Lital’s chest to hear their mother’s heartbeat,” said Beilinson Hospital’s Director of the Department of Cardiothoracic Surgery Prof. Dan Aravot who performed the heart transplant and has been overseeing Valenci’s recovery. “We often talk about the physical recovery after a transplant but there is an emotional component that comes with it, and it was very important to Lital to meet the Dee family and share her condolences with them and how appreciative she is to have the gift of life and watch her children grow up because of Lucy Dee.”

“In most transplant cases, we don’t know the donor and his family, we have no faces or life stories to relate to, but in this case, the day before the surgery, we – like all Israelis, heard the plea from Lucy’s daughters for all of Israel and the Jewish people to pray for their mother. When we got the news of the donation the following day, it was a hard moment for us all as we felt as though we knew Lucy, because we were all hoping for her to recover. As we transplanted her heart into Lital, we felt both the sadness of the moment but also how Lucy was giving Lital a chance of life and in some way a sense of victory and the continuation of life,” said Beilinson Hospital’s Director of Heart and Lung Transplants and Mechanical Support Programs Prof. Yaron Barac.

The Dee family also met Mordechi Elkabetz (51) who received one of her kidneys and Daniel Geresh (25) who received her liver. Elkabatz had been waiting for seven years for a kidney transplant. The fourth recipient, Ahmed Suliman (38) also received one of her kidneys but was not able to attend today’s meeting and sent a beautiful plaque with verses from the bible with a special tribute to Lucy Dee.