- [Narrator] March 2009.

Melissa Justice and her husband, Ray,

were coming back from a cruise

when Melissa began experiencingpains in her chest.

- I was 31 and I just feel like

you don't have a lot of aches and pains

so I didn't really think too much of it.

- [Narrator] Back home,the pains persisted

and Melissa decided to see a doctor.

An ultrasound brought shocking results.

- I'll never forget.

He said, "Normal hearts beat like this,

and yours is barely doing this."

- That initial shock of

something's wrong, ofsomething's different,

that knowledge that lifeis never gonna be the same,

or potentially never gonnabe the same again is jarring.

- [Narrator] The diagnosis,chronic systolic heart failure,

a condition where one chamber in the heart

can't pump blood effectively.

Melissa's heart was functioningat only 15% capacity.

They put her on medication,

but her best hope of survivalwas a heart transplant.

- It was like being told,

you know, you planned thiswhole future with your husband

and this beautiful familythat you had in your mind

and this beautiful career thatyou were working on so hard.

It was like having everything ripped out

from underneath you.

- [Narrator] After threemonths of medication,

Melissa's heart function hadgotten worse, dropping to 7%.

Needing more specialized care.

she was sent to OhioState University Hospital.

- That's bad heart failure, and that means

that you typicallyaren't able to do things

that you used to do, yournormal daily activities.

It's a life-altering diagnosis.

Even though, these days,

we keep a lot of these heartfailure patients alive,

it's not the same life.

- We would wake up every morning

and we would give ourselves an entire hour

where we'd just let ourselves grieve

that life that we were losing.

After that hour was over,we would come together

and we would pray, andwe would say, you know,

"We're gonna make the bestof this day that we can."

- [Narrator] Melissa hada heart pump implanted

in August of that year.

Along the way, Melissa started a blog

to chronicle her journeyand ask for prayer.

- Just tried to trustthat God would be with us.

I did not feel better.

I remember actually thinking,

"I cannot believe the humanbody can take this much pain."

Kept thinking, "Maybetomorrow I'll feel better,"

but months after the surgery,

I still was feeling very rough.

- What's the future gonna hold?

What's it gonna look like?

Will my wife still evenbe here in six months?

Will I need to plan a funeral?

- [Narrator] After fourmonths of little improvement,

it seemed a transplantwas still the best option.

After passing the candidacytest with perfect numbers,

Melissa was put at the topof the transplant list,

but only for 30 days.

On January 10, 2010, thelast day of her eligibility,

a suitable heart became available.

Melissa was wheeled infor surgery that night.

The best case scenario

was I was going to get this transplant

and it was gonna be fantastic,

and I was trying to preparefor the worst at the same time.

And I wanted to truly honor God.

Whether I passed or whether I lived,

I wanted to honor God in whatever I did.

- Praying for strength for her,

for as good of a recoveryas we could expect.

You know, if things did not go as planned,

you know, the grace to get through that,

the strength to getthrough those outcomes.

Dr. Perez comes out in,

two to three hours was the timeframe,

and we just all freeze,right, in the waiting room.

Either something's really, really good

or something's really, really bad.

(reverberating percussion)

- So I woke up and I thought, "Well,

I feel better than I thoughtI'd feel the first time,"

but I had only had, likeopen-heart was my first surgery,

so I expected to feel alot worse than I felt.

So when Ray came in, he said,

"Honey, you didn't get the transplant."

And I was like, "Aw,man, the heart was bad?"

And Ray said, "No, honey,your heart is better.

God healed your heart. Youdidn't need the transplant."

- [Narrator] Moments afterMelissa was put under,

her anesthesiologist, Dr. Perez,

decided to do one final test.

What he saw, he couldn't explain.

- I put the probe in andwhat I see is a heart

that is almost, but notquite, completely normal,

and it squeezed.

I kept looking at this heart

that was banging away virtually normally.

And she's not on anysupportive drugs at all.

The surgeon looked at that heart,

he saw what I saw, and said,

"I can't give her a heartthat works better than this."

- The morning of my not transplant,

I remember my surgeon coming in,

and he said, "Melissa, we haveno idea what made you sick

and we have no ideawhat's made you better."

And we said, "We do." We knew.

- [Narrator] Months later,the pump was removed.

Today, after more than a decade,

Melissa's heart is still going strong.

And while it's not quite 100%,

she's still able to be theactive mother of two adopted boys

and loving wife that Godhas called her to be.

- It's still tough somedays, but it's life.

I still wake up in the morning

and I say, "Thank you,God, for healing my heart."

- Seeing Melissa today,over 10 years later,

still with her own heart,living a normal life,

it's just a privilege tohave been a part of it.

- We know miracles happen, right,

we read about them in theBible, but to see one,

to see something sotangible happen was amazing.

- I have a beautifullife, a very full life,

and I have life, which is the best part.

(dramatic music)