With her husband Matt staring into her eyes, Mallie fought back tears as she mustered the courage to whisper: “This is it, isn’t it?”
Hooked up to an oxygen tank, 26-year-old Matt glanced up at his loving wife and nodded.
Having waited helplessly on the transplant list for years, Matt had been deemed “too sick” to be eligible to receive a new pair of lungs.
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There, in his wife’s arms, he took his final breath.
“Our time together was perfect. I got my fairy tale,” Mallie tells 7Life of the whirlwind romance with her husband.
“But if there is one thing I can do with Matt’s story, it is to encourage people to have to conversations about organ donation.”
After Matt died in Mallie’s arms, on April 5, 2017, she made it her mission to share his story — of his passion for life and his passion to help others.
And she takes every opportunity she can to urge everyone to become an organ donor.
The couple’s love story began online.
With Matt in Canberra and Mallie across the world in the US state of Texas, the budding photographers sparked a virtual friendship.
They messaged back and forth, and soon exchanged Skype details so they could video call each other.
“It was something that developed out of nothing,” Mallie says.
“I remember telling my mum that if this fellow lived closer I would marry him.”
While Mallie sensed a romantic flare in their friendship, she wasn’t sure the feelings were mutual.
The pair began opening up about intimate details of their lives and soon Mallie learnt about Matt’s health issues.
His kidney and lungs were failing and, although his mum was a match for a kidney transplant, his lungs were too weak to survive the surgery.
However, his lungs did not yet require a transplant.
It was a devastating Catch-22.
“He was too healthy for a lung transplant, but too weak for a kidney transplant,” Mallie reveals about the heartbreaking irony of the situation.
“Early on, I knew how serious his health issues were.
“We spoke about his life expectation — it is surreal being told you have an expiry date.”
After Matt confided in Mallie about a first date that had gone poorly, the pair confessed their feelings for one another.
And before they knew it, Mallie had booked flights to Australia.
“I was going across the world to meet a stranger. I mean, everyone was telling me I was crazy,” she says.
“But when I landed in Sydney terminal and saw him for the first time, my heart stopped.
“I jumped into his arms and kissed him.”
Mallie says the moment she laid eyes on Matt was “indescribable”.
As Matt took Mallie to see the sights on her first trip Down Under, their feelings grew deeper.
And just 17 days after Mallie touched down, Matt proposed.
He continued to travel with his new fiancée to see kangaroos, sandy beaches and the Sydney Harbour Bridge.
But with her return flight already booked, their whirlwind romantic trip had to come to an end.
“It was so hard to leave my brand new fiancé there, and to try and plan a wedding across the world,” Mallie says.
Embracing life
She says the pair discussed a halfway point for a destination wedding where both families could meet and celebrate the union, but they couldn’t find the perfect place.
In January 2015, the couple decided to elope on a NSW beach and, just three months later, the plan was in place.
“It was a beautiful autumn day,” Mallie says, adding it was the wedding of her dreams.
After she moved to Australia, the couple set down roots in the ACT.
They filled their home with foster animals and spent weekends travelling the country.
“We knew our time would be limited, so we made the most of everything we did,” Mallie says.
“We would take spontaneous sunset drives and see wombats and kangaroos.
“We would wait until the Milky Way rose and learn to take astronomy photos together.
“We made the most of every moment and our adventures just became even better adventures together.
“Everything was an adventure, even grocery shopping.”
With Matt’s health a roller coaster, Mallie said it was not uncommon for them to spend an evening in Emergency.
However, he didn’t let it stop him from living his life.
He threw himself into his studies, dreaming of becoming a nurse to honour those who helped him on a daily basis.
“His goal in life was to help people and he just cared about everyone so much,” Mallie says.
But in April 2016, Mallie recalls the moment “everything changed”.
She received a phone call from a doctor revealing Matt was in the ICU.
“My heart stopped,” she says.
“I didn’t know what was happening, I just knew I needed to get there.”
When Mallie arrived, Matt was struggling to breathe, and doctors wanted to intubate him.
To do this, however, they would need to place him in an induced coma.
“They said if they did that, he wouldn’t wake up,” Mallie says.
“I just jumped on his bed, held his face in my hands and told him to relax and breathe with me.”
Mimicking long slow breaths, the pair stared into each others eyes and Matt’s breathing slowed and the couple synchronised each breath.
Mallie’s actions saved Matt’s life.
After he was stabilised, doctors revealed Matt’s lung function had dropped dramatically — to just eight per cent.
He needed a lung transplant, quickly.
After a rush of appointments, they organised a meeting in Sydney with the transplant team to discuss his options.
“All I could think of was, ‘This is it’,” Mallie says.
“But we were told it (transplant) was too high of a risk at failing, and it wouldn’t be fair to the donor’s family.
“All I heard was, ‘I am going to be a widow’.”
Mallie recalls the feeling of all the air being sucked out of the room as the sat in silence across from the specialist.
Matt turned to Mallie and said, “Let’s go home.”
They didn’t know how long they had left together, but Matt was sure he wanted to make every second count.
They began raising awareness for organ donation and, although it couldn’t save Matt’s life, it would potentially help to save others.
Sparking up conversations with neighbours and strangers, the pair made it their mission to talk about the importance of donating organs.
“It was about preventing other people from being in his position,” Mallie says.
Graduating uni
Alongside their mission to help increase donor rates, the pair continued to live every day like it was Matt’s last.
The couple knew they were living on borrowed time, they just didn’t know how much.
In February 2017, Matt was struck with an infection, and doctors revealed he would need to be connected to an oxygen tank for the rest of his life.
The news hit Matt hard.
Apart from anything, he was just 11 shifts and two essays shy of graduating from his nursing degree — and he needed to withdraw.
Remarkably, Australian Catholic University honoured his accomplishments.
And, in a moving graduating ceremony in which he wore a cap and gown, Matt was granted his tertiary qualification.
It is a moment for which his family is forever grateful.
Before Matt’s health went into sharp decline, the couple had been planning to travel around the country to offer free photography sessions — providing everlasting memories — to families impacted by organ transplants.
They named the business Mattalie Photography, a sign of their eternal bond.
Sadly, their dream never came to fruition.
As the afternoon of April 5, 2017, rolled around, Matt’s breathing began to change.
“I just woke Matt up and asked him if this was it, if it was time,” Mallie recalls.
“He just looked up and nodded.”
Mallie raced to phone Matt’s mother.
Then, saying goodbye for one final time, Mallie held her husband tight.
“His last words were, ‘I love you, you are my world’,” Mallie says.
“He slipped away in my arms, surrounded by the people he loved and his fur babies.”
Organ donation
Seven years on from Matt’s death, Mallie keeps his legacy alive by continuing his mission to raise awareness for organ donation.
“Just by starting the conversation with your family, they know you are willing to donate,” she says.
“I like to ask people why they don’t want to donate and, by telling them Matt’s story, hopefully I can help them make the decision more comfortable.
“For me, they (doctors) can take what they want (organs). I won’t need it.”
Despite their time together being cut short, Mallie wouldn’t change their fairytale union.
She would relive the heartache all over if she could spend just one more second with her soulmate.
If you would like more information or organ donation, visit Gift of Life or Donate Life.