Pandemic rules protected Dunbar grad after liver transplant. ‘He was just like everybody else.’
weeks.jpg "Ben Weeks on the last day of his hospitalization after he received a liver transplant at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital in April 2020. Ben is a 2021 graduate of Lexington’s Paul Laurence Dunbar High School.")
Virtual learning in Lexington has its detractors, but Ben Weeks thinks it kept him safe after his 2020 liver transplant so he could graduate from Paul Laurence Dunbar High School this week.
Ben found out when he was 13 that he had autoimmune hepatitis and would eventually need a liver transplant. A donor match was found, he had transplant surgery on April 23, 2020, at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, and he got out of the hospital quickly with no extreme complications.
Ben had long known that a liver transplant would result in precautions: Wearing a mask, washing his hands frequently, learning from home for at least three months.
As the pandemic progressed and restrictions hit in 2020 to ward off COVID, Ben realized that most people were in the same boat as he was.
What people had to do with COVID, “really wasn’t any different from what he was having to do anyway,” said Ben’s mother Marti Weeks. “The virtual learning experience really helped Ben to be protected.”
“He was just like everybody else,” she said.
Graduation for Ben’s class is Thursday night at Rupp Arena.
In the fall, Ben said, he will live on campus at Transylvania University and study biochemistry, possibly with a double major of music technology. He wants to be an anesthesiologist.
When he was awaiting a transplant, he was offered a wish from the Make A Wish Foundation. Ben, 18, said his wish is still in the works. He wants to collaborate with a major recording artist, and when its possible, he wants to travel to a Missouri golf course that Tiger Woods designed.
Before COVID and his transplant, Ben’s close friends came over often and played music. That stopped when doctors said Ben had to stay confined for a time. Not seeing his friends was one of the things he missed the most.
In the meantime, he “got a great academic scholarship,” Marti Weeks said.
The family credits, in part, a guidance counselor who coordinated his coursework with his teachers.
“I got good grades through all that I went through in 2020,” said Ben. “Despite COVID and despite my liver transplant, everything turned out great for me.”