After 16 months of hell, back from the brink of death

[5 min read]

In this article: 

• With his liver failing, Jesse Goss was preparing to transfer to hospice and say his final goodbyes to his family and friends. 
• Then Providence Swedish's Organ Transplant Program accepted him for an evaluation. Five weeks later he got a call that a new liver was waiting for him. 
• But his road to back to health would be much rockier and longer than he imagined. 
• Today, Goss is sober, healthy and grateful for the expert and lifesaving care he recieved at Providence Swedish. 

His story had come to an end — or so Jesse Goss thought. After over 200 days in the hospital with liver failure, 36-year-old Jesse was out of options. 

Doctors said they couldn’t do anything more for him, so he prepared for the final transfer from hospital to hospice. He said goodbye to his teenage daughter and was baptized in his intensive care unit bed.  

“I expected the doctor to come in and say it’s time, but instead he tells me there’s been a change of plans,” Jesse recalls. “That Providence Swedish wants to look at me.” 

An ambulance ride later, Jesse found himself at Providence Swedish First Hill, where the transplant team began a series of medical tests. Three weeks later, he was approved for an organ transplant. Two weeks after that, Jesse was deemed stable enough to go home. Four days after being discharged, he received a call: there was a liver waiting for him. 

“Providence Swedish saved my life,” says Jesse, now 38 and thriving. “I went from being on my deathbed to receiving a new liver within six weeks.” 

The actual journey, though, took much longer. 

A failing liver, a downward spiral 

It was late 2020, and Jesse wasn’t feeling well. He decided to lie down for a quick rest and woke up to his mother, April, frantically pounding on his window. Jesse had been out cold for three days.  

At a hospital in Kirkland, Jesse was diagnosed with failing kidneys and non-alcoholic liver disease. Doctors instructed him to lose weight, adopt a more nutritious diet, and stop drinking.  

Everything was going to plan: Jesse made positive lifestyle changes, and his Model for End-stage Liver Disease (MELD) score was almost back to a healthy liver range. But then he caught COVID in early 2022 and was admitted back to the hospital. It was the start of what Jesse describes as “16 months of hell.”  

Over the next year and a half, Jesse was hospitalized for 215 days. He needed to have his lungs and abdomen regularly drained of excess fluid, and his mental health took a hit. 

“I’m back to being a productive member of society. I’m trying my best to take good care of this second chance at life I was given.” 

“Jesse bounced in and out of the hospital and got progressively more ill,” explains his stepmother Shaunda, who moved to the Seattle area from Arizona to help care for Jesse. 

Together, they explored their options. Jesse had previously met with a transplant team at a major academic medical center back in 2021, after he was first diagnosed, but had been banned from the program after testing positive for alcohol. Now, although Jesse had been sober for over a year and was critically ill, the program still refused to consider him. Jesse thought all was lost. 

Finding hope at Providence Swedish 

As Jesse’s condition deteriorated, the ethics committee at the Kirkland hospital where he was admitted reviewed his case. Jesse, who required over 200 blood transfusions during the length of his hospitalization, was stretching their blood supply and had little chance of surviving without a transplant. The committee decided he needed to go to hospice care. That’s when a hospitalist contacted Providence Swedish’s transplant team, and a serendipitous connection was made. 

Providence Swedish’s Organ Transplant Program is one of seven kidney transplant centers and one of just four liver transplant centers in the entire Pacific Northwest. A growing program, the team provides new beginnings to more than 150 individuals every year, including those who travel from across the region to receive care. 

“They evaluated Jesse even when the other program wouldn’t consider him,” Shaunda says. “They took a chance to provide Jesse an opportunity to live. We can’t repay that.” 

Shaunda was so grateful for the care Jesse received, she committed to making a recurring monthly donation to support the Organ Transplant Program. The hope, she says, is that her gifts will support and grow Providence Swedish’s program so that more patients can receive lifesaving care. 

“We are also so very thankful for the donor family, who gave despite their sorrow and grief so that others might live,” Shaunda adds.   

Taking care of second chances 

Today, Jesse has never been better. He’s back to work, after being on disability during his health issues, and is in a better physical and mental state than he’s been in years. He even posted about his experiences on YouTube, hopeful that sharing his story might help others. His daughter, who struggled while Jesse was sick, is also back to being a straight-A student. 

Life, in other words, is good. And, to Jesse, that’s the best way to pay it forward. 

“I’m back to being a productive member of society,” he says. “I’m trying my best to take good care of this second chance at life I was given.” 

Learn more and find a physician or Advanced Practice Clinician (APC) 

For more information about our organ transplant program, visit our Swedish Organ Transplant Center website or call 1-800-99ORGAN (1-800-996-7426).