BOWLING GREEN, Ky. – An organ donation united two Kentucky families.

Becky Grise and her donor, Kevin Harrod, have such a close-knit bond you’d guess they’d known each other for their whole lives.

“I almost know how he feels sometimes whether he thinks I do or not,” said Grise.

Their story began when Grise put up a billboard that asked Kentuckians for help. She has polycystic kidney disease and her only option was a kidney transplant.

She received a lot of calls, but it was Harrod’s that changed both of their lives.

“When you give a stranger a kidney, that says a lot about a person, I think,” said Grise.

Harrod saw Grise’s billboard on his way home from work every day. It reminded him of his parents. He lost both of his parents to cancer in 1994 and 1998 and decided to answer her plea for help.

“With cancer you can’t help anybody, there’s no transplants you can do,” said Harrod.

Their story is unique in the organ donation world. The pair said that most organ recipients and donors don’t get to meet right away or even at all.

Yet, the two of them were right down the hall at UK Healthcare were able to experience it together.

Grise and Harrod have a mother-son bond. The organ donation brought together their loved ones as well into one big family.

The pair takes time out of their schedules to advocate others to consider becoming an organ donor. They hope their story is able to help other families.

“There is somebody somewhere that needs an organ and you might be the one that can help them,” said Grise.