Hal Jay, longtime DFW radio host, tells the story of his life-saving heart transplant

Hal Jay, a longtime radio personality from North Texas, has returned home recovering from a few weeks in the hospital after undergoing a heart transplant that saved his life.

“I heard it. I heard it. It was ama… it was amazing,” he said while holding back tears. “Amazing.”

Hal, Ann Harbuck’s husband of nearly 50 years, is a father and grandfather. He is also a Texas Radio Hall of Famer who spent 42 years on the air with WBAP 820 AM.

Hal also lived with heart disease for several years. Congestive heart failure had weakened his heart, making it unable to pump blood to the rest of the body. Then ventricular tachycardia or V-tachycardia appeared.

“This is a very life-threatening heart rhythm disorder that causes you to pass out. If it doesn’t break, you’ll die from it,” said Dr. Shelley Hall, Hal’s cardiologist and head of transplant cardiology at Baylor University Medical Center.

An implanted defibrillator that returned Hal’s heart to a normal rhythm saved his life several times, but too many shocks weakened his heart.

“So one problem exacerbates another problem, which exacerbates the first problem, and it turns into this terrible spiral. We did our best,” Hall said.

Hall knew that her patient would need a new heart.

Reality hit when Hal passed out at home on January 10 at the age of 69. This incident put him on the list for a heart transplant, but the wait brought more anxiety and days of waiting.

Everyone knew this would happen except me. I thought, “I don’t need a heart transplant.”

Hal Jay

“It was a roller coaster. Once he failed to have a heart because he had too much fluid. Then they pumped out the liquid, and he was going to go home. Then he went back into the V-max,” Ann said.

That day, January 24, Hal believed he was dying and felt it happen.

“I had Ann’s hand. We were face to face. I said, “I love you very much. I love you more than anything in the world, but I’m going to die,” he said, reliving that day.

“He looked at me in panic. Panic. Panic,” his wife said.

Panic, but no fear. At that moment, Hal believed that he would win anyway.

“I’m winning. “Because if I lived, I’d still be with Ann and family. If I die, I’m with Josh,” Jay said.

Josh Harbuck was the couple’s eldest son. He was a husband and father of two when he died in a car accident at the age of 36. The six year anniversary of Josh’s death came almost on the same day that Ann saw Hal struggling to breathe.

“I was in the corner, praying. They had to shock him twice. It was pretty scary,” Ann said.

“We’re like, ‘We tried. You will be in intensive care until it is time for a transplant,” Hall said. “He got worse and we had to speed up our support and he moved up the list.”

“I fully expected it to be six weeks or two months or something. Once I got to level 2, I caught a break. And it happened, I think, within 10 days,” Hal said.

As Hal remained in the intensive care unit, he was ordered to keep his phone to himself. He will be called when and if a donor heart appears.

“I was here at the hospital and my phone rang,” he said, describing the call that changed his life. “This is Stacey White from Baylor Transplant and she said, all she said was, ‘THIS IS A CALL.’ I almost lost it. I called Ann.

Ann, who had stayed at her husband’s bedside day and night, returned home to pick up some things.

“I’m standing in the Target parking lot and he says, ‘Ann. Anna. They called me. I asked: “What?” And he says, “I got a call.” And so, I just started crying. And I said, “Are you kidding? Are you joking?’ He says, “I’m going in for surgery tonight,” Ann recalls.

The transplant, an open-heart surgery that will replace Jay’s dying organ with a healthy heart from a donor, was performed in the wee hours of Saturday, February 3rd.

Four and a half hours later, Hal returned to the room. Nine days later, Hal was discharged and sent home permanently.

NBC 5 was there on his first post-Baylor visit. He is still weak from the operation and all the days in the hospital room, but the heart that is now in his chest is beating fast.

“Do you want to see it? I don’t mind showing it,” he said, unbuttoning his shirt to reveal a chest slit. The incision will heal, but will forever remain a visible reminder of the operation that saved his life.

“He did phenomenally well,” Hall said. “That was all the preparatory work before he needed a transplant. He went into surgery strong, despite being supported by a mechanical pump, and came out strong. My heart started beating right away.”

“We have been blessed,” Ann said. “All prayers. Now it seems like a dream, because when you look at it, it looks exactly the same. He’s Hal Jay again.

“A day or two after the operation, I felt like I was born again. I can’t wait to get back to work,” Hal said.

“Everyone goes through a lot these days, but we’ve been blessed and that’s the hardest part. Why?” Ann asked.

“I never want to forget that somewhere the family is also suffering, but maybe it’s not because they gave me life,” Hal said.

Hal is unsure if he will meet the donor’s family. He was advised to focus on recovery during the first year.

“We encourage them, if they want, to contact the donor family or the donor family to the recipients. I think that the meeting of the two sides is a very healing process,” Hall said.

While Hal and his wife wrestle with the question “Why him?” part of the answer may lie in a promise to be there for his family for as long as he can.

“I briefly remember coming out of surgery. I looked up and said, “God, thank you so much.” The next thing I did was say “Josh” and look up. I said, “I’m not going to be there yet. I have a few more years to watch my grandchildren grow up,” Hal said, wiping away tears.

“He just wants to watch our grandchildren grow up and be with our family,” Ann said. “That’s really all we care about in life and we talk about it.”

“I’m looking for publicity. What I am grateful for is that I can tell people about organ donation. It’s so important, but you won’t know it until you’re face to face with it,” Hal said.

Organ donation, regular checkups, gratitude, family and faith are the messages that Hal Jay will deliver into the microphone when he returns to the air on WBAP.

He takes several medications, including one to keep his body from rejecting the new organ. He will also be making regular visits to the medical team over the next year, but as his cardiologist puts it, in 12 months it will be like sending a kid off to college. She will see him every three months.

REGISTER TO BE ORGAN DONOR IN TEXAS

Registering as an organ donor in Texas is quick and easy and can be done in a number of ways.

You can register online at donatelifetexas.org, the non-profit organization that operates the state’s registry, in any of the following ways. By mail – forms can be downloaded here; by visiting the Texas Department of Public Safety and selecting YES when applying for or renewing your driver’s license or renewing your vehicle; by checking the box when obtaining a hunting or fishing license online through the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department; or, if you’re an iPhone user, using the medID tab in the iPhone Health app.

When Texans apply for a new or renewed driver’s license, they are asked, “Would you like to join the organ donor registry?” But the actual ways of organ donation are not as simple as registration. Dallas Morning News reporter Natalie Keomungkhun explains in her report.

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