LITTLE ROCK, Ark. – It was a miracle one Arkansan wasn’t sure would happen or not, but it did.

For years Janesha Coleman has been waiting on a heart transplant, and when one was donated, she said it was life-changing.

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Now 34 years old, Coleman was diagnosed with congestive heart failure after having her second child in 2019.

“It felt like I was drowning all the time,” Coleman said.

Unfortunately, in 2022 during her next pregnancy, her health only worsened.

“We found out the left side [of her heart] wasn’t functioning so I had to get this impella placed in me, it helped me breathe better,” Coleman said.

But after her heart stopped for a second time, she was eventually admitted into Baptist Health in November of 2023 going on a waiting list for a heart transplant.

Officials with ARORA say there are more than 3,300 people listed on the national organ waiting list for a heart transplant.

“You never know what is going to happen and you never know when your time is coming,” Coleman said.

For Coleman, hope arrived sooner than she expected.

“December 1st, they told me I was receiving the heart,” she said. “I remember getting on the operating table but after that, I don’t remember anything but waking up.”

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KARK 4 News spoke with Coleman eight weeks after her surgery. She said until flu season is over she has to live a new reality.

“I have to wear a mask and I have to wear gloves because my immune system is low,” she explained.

Coleman said the stitches on her chest from her transplant remind her that she is a warrior. She said the main reason she fought so hard was because she’s a single mother of three children.

“Sometimes I did feel like giving up, but I couldn’t give up. I have three kids.” Coleman said, “I used to wake up at night with nightmares of me dying and being away from them and they not knowing what to do.”

She said her religion kept her going through the darkest time of her life.

“I prayed that they would be okay and if something did happen to me, I prayed that they would stick together,” Coleman said.

She said she is grateful to her now guardian angel, the organ donor, for her new life.

“I got someone else’s heart and I’m very thankful for them even being a donor,” Coleman said.

Knowing every breath is more precious than the last, she said she appreciates her faith and is not taking her health for granted.

“It brings so many emotions because I received a new heart,” Coleman said. “I had an open-heart transplant and that’s a miracle and I believe that’s God.”

Coleman said she has to take 18 medications because of the transplant so she can continue to see her kids grow up.

“I hope that my heart doesn’t reject, I hope that I can still be here. I hope that God keeps on blessing me,” she said.

Her mother, Algerita Coleman, shares her daughter’s joy with her no longer being in pain.

“The weakness I felt not being able to do anything for her in that situation was heavy,” she said, “For her to be a young mother and have the determination and drive to want her kids to have their mother in their life and for her to do better it showed her parenting skills outweighed mine.”

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Even if Coleman’s time with loved ones looks different for a while, she said she doesn’t mind.

“Every time my family comes around they wear their masks too,” she said.

Coleman said when she feels lost or has any doubts she often leans on her faith.

“I feel like God puts you in situations to see how strong you are and to see what your faith is in him,” she said. “I have been close to God but this really brought me close to God.”

She is cherishing her new life along with her new heart.

“God really gave me a second chance at this thing called life,” Coleman said.

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