Lori Wood had known Jonathan Pinkard for barely two days when she asked him a question that changed both their lives forever.
He was 27 years old, had autism, and had a heart that needed a transplant. He had collapsed at the end of a work shift in August 2018 and, from then on, went in and out of the hospital. The doctors were clear: without a family to care for him after surgery, he could not remain on the transplant list. His grandmother, who had raised him, had died in 2012. His mother was in a rehabilitation facility. When he was discharged, he slept at a men’s shelter because he had nowhere else to go.
In December 2018, Lori, an ICU nurse at Piedmont Newnan hospital in Georgia, was assigned to his case. And after two days of caring for him, she asked if she could be his legal guardian. Jonathan moved into her home in Hogansville, and together they spent months fighting to get him accepted back onto Emory’s transplant list. In July 2019, Lori officially became his guardian. A month later, in August, Jonathan received his new heart.
Now she cares for him, making sure Jonathan takes his 34 pills a day, and helps him learn to live independently. And now he calls her “Mom”.
