Bayville Native Pins Book About Liver Transplant Journey

A Bayville native takes the life lessons he learned in coping with a near-deadly liver disease and writes a book to encourage others.

Dan Bonner is Author of the book 'Gifted: My Journey Through Illness and Liver Transplant'. He says he's hoping to show readers that life still happens even when dealing with a health crises.

He says his dad was also very sick and died when he was dealing with a diagnosis with a debilitative liver disease at the age of 28 but he says he lived through it by drawing strength from the people around him. Bonner says he also began and completed Grad School through the ordeal and eventually married his wife Sue, who he calls a Tower of Strength.

Bonner says "When you're in need of a transplant or you have any type of chronic illness, that there are people out there like me who are able to go on and continue to live a normal life and while it's not easy, it's well worth it. So I just want people to be encouraged by my story so that they keep finding the motivation to live their lives as fulfilling as they can."

Bonner received his liver transplant at the age of 32, while only on the organ recipient list six weeks. He says that's the primary reason why he named his book 'Gifted'. He goes into it more when talking about one of his favorite chapters toward the end of the publication called 'From Ordinary To Extraordinary'.

He says "that really when I had been on the waiting list, even though it was six weeks, my health had deteriorated even to the point where I didn't have much time left to live. Doctors projected that I had about two weeks left to live before I got the transplant and you see how in those weeks, that events changed in such a special way that it put me in the right place, at the right time, to get the transplant and it's really just an amazing culmination of events."

Bonner says there are over 110,000 people on waiting list across the country for a life-saving organ but he says when compared to other diseases, it boils down to being a very small number of people. He believes that because of that, the group is often overlooked.

Bonner is now 38 and says in March, he'll have lived with his transplanted liver for seven years. He says he has to take anti-rejecton medication for the rest of his life and has faced several rounds of rejection health scares forcing his hospitalization but he says he hasn't had any major problems since 2007.

He says "he wants the book to touch people in such a way that they find the strength and courage within themselves to pursue whatever it is in life that they're most passionate about and a lot of times that will spill over into other people who need help. So, it's almost a very sort of subdue message of "pay it forward". Start with yourself. Make sure that you're whole and that you are very good to go and as soon as you're able to do that, you're able to touch so many people in positive ways and I would encourage folks to do that."

Bonner will be holding a private book signing event this weekend at the Toms River Quality in on Route 37. However, he invites you to read the first chapter for free on his website www.dbonner.com