Print

Email story

Comment

Letter to the editor

Illness launched a drive for more donors on registry

By NOVA BEALL, Times Staff Writer
Published August 22, 2007

Largo resident Joseph P. Grimsley died Sunday, Aug. 19, 2007, at Tampa's H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center and Research Institute of acute myelogenous leukemia (AML), an aggressive cancer of the blood and bone marrow. He was 35.

Mr. Grimsley's illness prompted more awareness of the need for African-Americans and other ethnic groups to register for the National Bone Marrow Donor Registry.

The husband and father of three was diagnosed with the disease early in 2006 when his muscles began to ache. Some days the pain was so bad, the APSCO Appliance Center delivery driver could barely walk.

"I've known Joe since he was 12," said APSCO Appliance Center's general manager, Al Graco. "I hired him after he graduated high school. Everybody liked him. He worked hard as a delivery driver and really did a good job."

A lifelong resident of the area, Mr. Grimsley was born in Dunedin on Oct. 8, 1971, and attended Pinellas Park High School. He married Adriana Evette in 2001. The couple has a son, Joel, and two daughters, Asia and Ada.

Immediately after the diagnosis of AML, Mr. Grimsley began heavy chemotherapy. When doctors determined he would need a bone marrow transplant, his 36-year-old brother, Larry, was tested as a donor, but did not match. Nor did any of the 6-million registered donors in the National Marrow Donor Program.

Last year, during Mr. Grimsley's illness, his mother, Ethel Grimsley, of Largo expressed her hopes. "I have a strong belief in God and he will perform a miracle himself or find him a donor."

She fostered a spiritual relationship with her son. She tried to keep him encouraged, called him daily and read Scripture to him.

"From the beginning, Joseph said 'I'm not angry with God," said Ethel Grimsley. "What's happening to me is happening for a reason."

She also organized more than a dozen local bone marrow and blood donor drives in hopes of finding a match for her son and to encourage more registration of donors of diverse racial and ethnic heritage.

"And if we don't find a donor for him, we will help someone else in the process. We win both ways," she said.

Race and ethnicity are important factors because tissue types are inherited and patients are most likely to match someone with a similar heritage.

In addition to Mr. Grimsley's wife, children and mother, all of Largo, he is survived by his father, George Sr. of Alabama; a brother, George Jr. of Largo; a sister, Patricia of New Jersey; and numerous uncles, aunts, nephews, nieces and cousins.

There will be a viewing from 6 to 8 p.m. Friday at Macedonia Missionary Baptist Church, 450 E Oakwood St., Tarpon Springs and a funeral service at 2 p.m. Saturday at the same location. Young's Funeral Home is in charge of arrangements.

In lieu of flowers, donations to the Joseph Grimsley Medical and Family Fund can be made at any Bank of America location.

To help

Donor registry

For information about the National Donor Registry and bone marrow donation, visit www.marrow.org.

[Last modified August 21, 2007, 20:56:53]