A 5-year-old boy in need of a liver transplant got the surprise of his lifetime when his former daycare teacher volunteered as a donor — showing up at his home with balloons and a teddy bear.
“I’m going to share my liver with you, buddy,” Carissa Fisher, now 21, told Ezra Toczek, 5, in a viral video posted on Facebook.
In her video, Fisher visited Ezra and his mother Karen Toczek at their home in Alden, New York, with a poster board that read, “Hey Ezra, would you like to share my liver?” and a box for him to check, “Yes” or “No.”
“Oh my gosh,” exclaimed Karen in the video. “Are you serious?” Turning to Ezra, she said, “Ms. Carissa has a liver for you!” while Ezra beamed.
Fisher knelt down to Ezra’s eye-level and he checked off the “YES” box with a marker.
“It felt like something I had to do,” Fisher, 21, tells TODAY.com in an interview. “I wanted to see this kid get better.”
In 2019, Karen and Ron Toczek welcomed Ezra, then a seven-month-old foster child, into their home. Ezra was born medically fragile and doctors knew he might need a liver transplant. Ezra became part of the Toczek family, comprising seven biological kids, two stepsons and currently, two foster children. In 2022, Karen and Ron adopted Ezra.
Ezra was diagnosed with end-stage liver disease and required a liver transplant. In February 2024, Karen shared a Facebook post about her search for a liver donor and a fundraiser to help pay for Ezra’s medical care. It caught the eye of Carissa Fisher, Ezra’s former teacher at Precious People Daycare.
Fisher recalls Ezra as “a ball of energy” in her classroom.
“We were pretty close,” says Fisher. “A lot of foster kids need to find a rock and I ended up being that rock for Ezra.”
Fisher immediately clicked the post’s QR code to apply to donate.
“My brother initially thought I was kind of crazy and my mom said, ‘We gotta sit down and think about that,’ but there wasn’t even a second thought,” says Fisher. “I had the means of helping this kid — I have to help him — and if I were 5 years old, I’d want someone to do it for me ... I had zero doubts.”
Karen was in the dark that Fisher — whom she had never formally met when Ezra attended her daycare — had secretly applied to donate her liver.
“I didn’t want to get anyone’s hopes up,” says Fisher.
Because Ezra is a child, he required a smaller portion of liver than an adult. According to the Cleveland Clinic, “The liver is the only organ that can regenerate itself and grow from a small piece back to its full size.”
On May 24, after Fisher spent months getting medical testing to make sure she was a match, Fisher got the phone call she had been waiting for. “I sat by my phone all day,” she says.
Karen tells TODAY.com that Fisher’s gesture was “wild.”
“Carissa is so young to be absolutely certain that she would do this,” Karen says, adding, “From a mom’s perspective, what an amazing thing to know that your child would be willing to do that for somebody.”
Fisher was 20 when she made the offer, and 21 when the liver transplant surgery happened on Aug. 7.
“Good morning — it’s transplant day!” Karen wrote on Facebook.
“Ezra struggled a bit this morning — he definitely knew today was different,” she wrote. “There were quiet tears, silly smiles, snuggles, thrown silly putty .... He made his demands clear — red popsicles, and he advocated for himself (negotiated fiercely — he was NOT going to take any more than two breaths with his mask — final answer). I asked for a picture last thing before we went in, and he was adamant that he was done with pictures.”
A different sort of photo was taken during their surgery.
Fisher tells TODAY.com that she saw photos of her and Ezra’s liver in the hospital.
“My liver was red and smooth and looked really healthy,” she recalls. “Ezra’s liver was orange and black, from the build-up of scar tissue — it didn’t look like a liver.”
The transplant surgery was successful for Ezra and Fisher; Ezra spent 45 days in the PICU and had three more surgeries on top of the transplant.
Fisher had approximately 30% of her liver removed.
“Afterward, I sat up and felt everything shift — you could also hear it ... like water swishing around,” she says. “It felt really weird.” According to Fisher, doctors expect her liver to be regenerated in less than one year.
Fisher reunited with Ezra in the hospital in between his medical complications. She remembers him “laughing, smiling and cracking jokes.”
Ezra was discharged from the hospital on September 20 and moved into a Ronald McDonald House near his medical team for follow-up care. According to a Facebook post shared by Karen, Ezra was enjoying eating Happy Meals for lunch and Fisher tells TODAY.com that she mailed Ezra packages of toys and Buffalo Bills gear to keep his spirits up.
Ezra has since been readmitted to the hospital after his bloodwork caused some concern, his mom says.
Now the Toczek family waits for the next chapter in Ezra’s healing.
Karen tells TODAY.com that it’s hard to comprehend Fisher’s selflessness.
“What Carissa did for Ezra and our family isn’t a stand-out thing — it’s very obviously who she is,” says Karen. “She is selfless in every area ... she told me, ‘I am going to keep an eye on Ezra and make sure he takes care of his liver.’”
