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OGDEN — Heidi Martin was born with half a heart, but that never stopped her from living a life that touched many lives with how she used it.
Martin died Jan. 12 — a day before her 30th birthday — from complications of a virus, according to her family. Funeral services were held on Thursday.
Those services tried to match Martin’s fun-loving personality.
“She wasn’t somebody that liked to dwell on the negativity and the sad parts of life,” said Brandon Hutchins, Martin’s brother-in-law. “Of course it was a sad time for the family just having to say goodbye one final time, but I think everyone in the services tried to keep it lighthearted and tried to share some of the fun things that Heidi did in her life.”
KSL featured Martin back in 2015 when she had received more than $15,000 in donations toward a rare surgery that gave her a new heart and liver. The donations went, in part, toward anti-rejection drugs Martin needed after the surgery.
Martin was born with half a heart and many of her organs on the wrong side of her body. She went through multiple heart surgeries before she had even turned 5.
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Heidi Martin was born with half a heart and many of her organs on the wrong side of her body. She undergone a number of procedures. Her family has raised over $15,000 for her treatment already and continues to accept donations.While at Primary Children’s Hospital, Martin got the nickname “Meidi Hartin” to reflect her mighty compassionate and kind heart.
However, Martin’s health struggles continued after her surgery, according to Hutchins.
Hutchins said that Martin dealt with several complications from the surgery, including cardiac arrest and kidney failure that put her on dialysis. Martin was also diagnosed with cancer in 2016.
"No matter what (Heidi) was going through personally, she always sought to find ways to brighten the lives of others no matter how much she hurt or how much she was going through." — Brandon Hutchins
Despite the challenges throughout life, Martin persevered. Prior to her transplant, Martin graduated from Bonneville High School and earned an associate degree in nursing from Weber State. She worked at McKay-Dee Hospital as a nurse before the surgery in 2015.
Hutchins said Martin even renewed her nursing license a couple of weeks ago and looked forward to getting back to being a nurse. She also planned on adopting a daughter in the future because of her love for kids and also wanted to travel around the world.
While family and friends attended her viewing as expected, others that encountered Martin at various points in her life also came by to pay their respects. Some were Martin’s former nurses or even fellow dialysis patients.
All of them positively affected by Martin in one way or another.
“Some of them didn’t even know her very long,” Hutchins said. “They only knew her for maybe a small period of time, but she had a big influence over them.”
Hutchins said it was reflective of the life she lived.
“She went through an awful lot hard things in her life because of her physical afflictions and things that she had with her heart and through it all, no matter what she was going through personally, she always sought to find ways to brighten the lives of others no matter how much she hurt or how much she was going through,” he said.
“That was always her first instinct — to go try to help others and to try to help brighten their lives if there was an opportunity to do so.”
