WSJ reporter Russolillo donates kidney to mother in law

Steven Russolillo

Wall Street Journal reporter Steve Russolillo writes about donating a kidney to his mother in law just three weeks after marrying her daughter, Shelly Banjo of Bloomberg Gadfly.

Russolillo writes, “I married my wife on May 29. Three weeks later, I was lying in a New York City hospital recovery room. My new mother-in-law was a few beds away, my kidney flushing toxins from her body.

“When my wife, Shelly Banjo, and I began dating six years ago, I learned that polycystic kidney disease ran in her family. It is a genetic disease where cysts grow on kidneys, eventually destroying them. Shelly’s mother, Batya Banjo, would eventually need a kidney transplant. Some day, Shelly also might need one.

“Now, Batya refers to me affectionately as her new son and ‘kidney buddy.’ I’ll be thinking about her, recovering back at her home in Texas, as I run the New York City Marathon on Sunday.”

Read more here.

Chris Roush

Chris Roush was the dean of the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. He was previously Walter E. Hussman Sr. Distinguished Professor in business journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a former business journalist for Bloomberg News, Businessweek, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Tampa Tribune and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. He is the author of the leading business reporting textbook "Show me the Money: Writing Business and Economics Stories for Mass Communication" and "Thinking Things Over," a biography of former Wall Street Journal editor Vermont Royster.