When you adopt from a foreign country, among the many thoughts that flit through your mind is this: if my child were ever to become sick they have no biological relatives we can count on. But when they hand you your infant and you are family, you tuck this thought away in the outer recesses of your mind and you hope never to retrieve it.

Owen and Linda Wells were not so lucky.

When their daughter Kailee was diagnosed with severe aplastic anemia at the age of 5, their best chance of saving her was to find a match half a world away.

If you haven’t read Part One of Kailee’s incredible story, check out Two Worlds, One Child, Part One.

In that, they were lucky.

Kailee’s birthplace was China and this land of one billion people made Kailee their own. After three and a half years of pain and horror for Kailee, a young man, a doctor, walked into a donor station, had his cheek swabbed and discovered he was the perfect match for a little 8-year-old girl who lived 10,000 miles away.

His name was Wang Lin. And his family was not happy.

It was one thing to go with all your medical school classmates and sign up for the donor registry. It was quite another to go through almost a week of shots to help build up the precious stem cells and then let them harvest your bone marrow. They were horrified. But Wang Lin did it anyway.

But even with a perfect match, would Kailee’s body accept the bone marrow? The donation worked—but not as well as hoped. With over 95 percent of her marrow now Wang Lin’s, Kailee’s body finally was making red and white blood cells. But the platelets refused to give. Through the Chinese Red Cross, Owen and Linda asked Wang Lin to donate again. This is against Chinese law. The same donor may not give more than once.

“We were on pins and needles waiting to hear,” says Linda. Finally, word came.

It was a go. Wang Lin donated again and Kailee received a “boost.”

That boost proved to be the elixir of life. Today, Kailee is as normal an American child as one could hope to meet. She loves school. She’s a Girl Scout. She likes to read and cook and play cards. True, she may need platelet infusions since her own never really did kick in. But she’s alive and happy and thriving. Thanks to a man, a perfect stranger, who saw the opportunity to help a little girl in need and took it.

This past December, the China Marrow Donor Program and the Red Cross Society of China brought Kailee and her family to China to meet Wang Lin.

It wasn’t private— the meeting was held in a gigantic hall filled with press, dignitaries, doctors, Chinese friends, and, somewhere in the crowd, Wang Lin. But it was personal.

When, in a deeply dramatic moment, officials asked Kailee if she could pick out her donor, to the delight and astonishment of everyone present she did so immediately. That’s when the tears began. “How do you thank someone for giving your child the gift of life?” asks Linda.

And how do you thank a nation for giving your child life, not just at birth but again and again? Linda and Owen’s dedication to increasing the ranks of the World Bone Marrow Registry has resulted in more than 90,000 Americans signing up. Their battle to save Kailee has swelled the number of Chinese donors to over 750,000. From these 750,000, 800 people have donated the “gift of life” to those in need around the world.

And so two worlds—one American, one Chinese—collide and in their wake people everywhere are touched and given hope. No one expresses this brave new world better than Wang Lin when he wrote a letter to the Wells:

Dear Kailee, Owen and Linda,

I am so happy to know that with each day as you grow, you will have grown to be a beautiful child. With so many warm-hearted doctors who were so concerned about your new improvements every hour and every minute, each new update on Kailee brought us immense joy. As unfortunate as it was that Kailee had to go through this experience, as parents, Owen and Linda, your love for your child has touched our country’s people. It has influenced our warmhearted people to participate and register. Giving these patients hope for a second life is such a grand effort and meaningful work. I am a doctor myself and helping people, such as Kailee, is also my happiness. Perhaps our meeting was fate. I have confidence that Kailee will be 100 percent herself again because she is surrounded by an ocean of love and the world’s love and kindness is on her side. Let’s hope the world can save others like Kailee and give them hope.

Your friend,
Kailee’s Donor

By Jamie Simons for PeterGreenberg.com.

For more information on bone marrow drives and how you can save someone’s life, check out www.marrow.org or kaileegetwells.com.

Read more uplifting travel stories from the Grateful Traveler series.

If you’re interested in traveling to China, don’t miss our Comprehensive Guide to Traveling to China, Beijing and the Olympics.