A child in Michigan once was blind but now she sees because a young gymnast from Frankfort obtained her parents’ consent to become an organ donor.
Madeleine “Maddie” Grobmeier was attending a concert last summer in Rosemont when she suffered a severe asthma attack. Her parents rushed to Advocate Lutheran General Hospital in Park Ridge after the mother of Maddie’s friend alerted them of the emergency.
Maddie died in the hospital three days later, having never regained consciousness. It was the day after her 18th birthday, just weeks after she graduated from Lincoln-Way East High School in Frankfort. She would have been a freshman at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse when last school year opened.
Maddie’s distraught parents, Frank and Cyndi Grobmeier, not only fulfilled her request to donate her organs and tissue but founded a nonprofit foundation to promote awareness of organ transplantation and encourage teens to have the same kind of candid conversation about it with friends and family that Maddie did.
Three months before she died, Maddie and two friends survived a serious rollover car accident on LaGrange Road while driving from school to gymnastics practice, Cyndi Grobmeier said.
“Miraculously, all three girls walked away with just bumps and bruises,” she said.
“A week later, she sat us down, said the car accident scared her and she wanted to let us know that if anything like that happened again — and she didn’t make it — she wanted to be an organ donor,” Frank Grobmeier said.
“Promise me that you’ll donate my organs so that something good can come from tragedy,” Maddie told her parents, they recall.
Maddie donated her heart, liver, kidneys, corneas and other tissue, her father said. “That was her decision and we respected it.”
The Maddog Strong Foundation was born last August, less than two months after Maddie died. By creating the nonprofit, the Grobmeier family plans to continue telling her story, “inspiring other teens to have that conversation about organ and tissue donation,” its mission states.
Nearing its first year anniversary, the foundation plans a giving tree dedication ceremony honoring organ and tissue donors and their families at 11 a.m. Sunday. The program will begin at the Frankfort Square bandshell, 7540 W. Braemer Lane in Frankfort, and proceed to the Island Prairie Park tree grove.
Families of deceased organ and tissue donors are encouraged to email their loved ones’ names, year they passed and donated gift to info@maddogstrong.org, to be read aloud during the ceremony. It was originally scheduled as part of the Maddog Strong fund’s inaugural 5k and 10k race fundraiser, which was postponed until next year.
“Maddog” was the nickname her father gave Maddie in her infancy that stuck the rest of her life. “I was holding this tiny baby, so fragile and little, and then she’d let out this giant scream, like the roar of a Lion, that reminded me instantly of Chicago Cubs pitcher Greg Maddux, whose nickname was Mad Dog,” Grobmeier said. “She definitely grew into it; she was feisty.”
The tot’s feistiness landed her in gymnastics classes when she was 2. “She wouldn’t sit still,” Cyndi Grobmeier said. “We had to do something to burn off her energy. So, gymnastics was perfect.”
Enrolled at Gym-Kinetics in Mokena, she later competed on its gymnastic teams all her life. An all-around gymnast, she competed in all four women’s events — vault, uneven bars, balance beam and floor exercise, Cyndi said.
“It definitely made her a leader. It always amazed me how much the younger kids looked up to her and how good she was with them. She had a big heart.”
During an away meet in Michigan, Maddie’s coach fell ill and was hospitalized, “so she stepped in to help with the younger kids for the rest of the meet,” Cyndi added.
At Lincoln-Way East, Maddie volunteered as an adaptive physical education leader, helping kids with special needs in gym class, Frank Grobmeier noted. “She was a typical teenager, but she had a servant’s heart. She always wanted to help others.”
Despite having asthma, Maddie became a top gymnast on teams fielded by Gym-Kinetics. “She didn’t let her asthma stop her,” Cyndi said. She was later awarded a full scholarship by the University of Illinois at Chicago, but she lost it when UIC cancelled its gymnastics program.
Jim Fredrickson, the owner of Gym-Kinetics, was more than just Maddie’s coach during her 16 years at his school, but a mentor whom she called her second dad, the Drobmeiers said.
“Jim remained by Maddie’s side the entire time she was hospitalized,” Cyndi said. He joined the Grobmeier family in the honor walk for Maddie. An honor walk is a ceremonial event to commemorate an organ donor, which typically takes place as the patient is transported to an operating room for organ procurement.
Maddie earned hundreds of medals, 20 to 30 per year, in gymnastic competitions since age 6, Frederickson noted.
“She was a fantastic kid,” he added. “She became our top gymnast and a leader of our team, always making sure she was taking care of younger kids. She set a very good example. I always considered Maddie as like a daughter to me.”
Today, Fredrickson serves on Maddog Strong’s board of directors. “I do it not only to spread awareness about organ donation, but to pass on Maddie’s legacy,” he said. “She always did help others. All the way to her dying day, she helped others. I like to help carry that on.”
Nearly 11,900 organ transplants from deceased donors are performed a year, said Frank Grobmeier, the foundation’s executive director. Last year, 2019, was the ninth record-breaking year. More than 120,000 people are on a waiting list for an organ transplant, he added. The most common need is for kidneys.
On average, 17 patients died every day waiting for a transplant in 2018, according to the United Network for Organ Sharing.
“It’s a topic that would be good for people to know about and discuss,” Cyndi Grobmeier, president of the Maddog Foundation, said of organ donation.
“It’s not talked about often because I don’t think people want to talk about the death of a loved one,” Frank offered.
“There are myths about it,” Maddie’s older sister, Sam, said. “A lot of people are afraid that if they were in a life-threatening situation, the hospital won’t try as hard to save their life. I can flatly say that is not the case. The people at Lutheran General did everything they could for Maddie.
“Many people think their religion doesn’t support it. In fact, all faiths in the U.S. see it as the final gift someone can give.”
The social media coordinator for the Maddog Foundation, Sam was a year ahead of her younger sister in school. Although they had different interests, Sam said: “We were definitely close. We had a playful, bickering relationship but were close sisters.
“We were pretty opposite. She was the more athletic one, while I’m interested in art, music and theater. After playing lead roles in high school musicals, Sam is nearing her junior year of study in musical theater and production at New York University.
Sam and her parents are determined to preserve Maddie’s legacy by inspiring others “to have the conversation.”
“Especially for young people, it’s really important to know how important organ donation is and to have those conversations,” Sam said. “We all think we have a long life to live, but you never know.
“You’re saving lives. It’s your last gift that you can give. Something good can really come from loss. You’re literally giving life, or in the case of tissue donation, improving lives.”
Jack Murray is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown.
