Melissa Roberts didn't always have the life she has now. She has been a nurse at AnMed for almost five years - but if you spend a few minutes listening to her talk about her passion for helping patients, it's hard to imagine that she has ever done anything else.
Providing care for people who need it is that important to her.
She knows what it's like for someone you love to need care. Roberts has been a family member on the other side at a hospital, feeling helpless. Holding the hand of someone she loves. Hoping that person will be healthy again.
That time in Roberts' life has shaped every day that has followed.
It led her recently to give a gift that changed the life of a total stranger.
AnMed Cancer Center experience connected Melissa Roberts with 'amazing people'
Roberts says she is where she is today because her own family's life was turned upside down by a health crisis in March 2017.
She was a wife, a mother and a sales associate at a beauty-supply store. She was happily living a normal life with her husband, Glenn, and their baby girl.
Their daughter was just 6 months old when everything changed.
Her husband was found to have tonsil cancer. It was on his left tonsil and had spread to a lymph node.
For the next two months, the family spent time each weekday at AnMed Outpatient Infusion. It is part of AnMed Cancer Center and is where Glenn Roberts received dozens of radiation treatments and chemotherapy.
"We met the most amazing people," Melissa Roberts said. "They were there during one of the most difficult times of our lives. I felt in my heart like I could do that, too - like I could be someone who helps someone else when they need it most."
So she set out to do it.
Her husband's full recovery and his cancer's remission helped.
Pitch from NMDP led to nurse's donation of bone marrow
In 2018, Melissa Roberts started taking nursing courses at Greenville Technical College.
Roberts was still a fairly new student when representatives of the National Marrow Donor Program, formerly known as Be The Match, gave a presentation in one of her classes. The organization, which is now known only by the initials NMDP, describes itself as "a global nonprofit leader in cell therapy."
"We help find cures and save lives for patients with blood cancers and disorders," NMDP says on its website.
Roberts was struck by the organization's pitch to her class years ago.
"I remember them talking about how, if we were a healthy match for someone, we could donate blood stem cells with little to no pain, and we could potentially save somebody's life," Roberts said recently. "I thought, 'Why wouldn't we do that if we could?'"
Like almost everyone else who heard the presentation that day, Roberts decided to swab her cheek - just in case she could help someday.
Then she forgot about it.
She graduated from Greenville Technical College with an associate's degree in nursing and has been working at AnMed since June 2020. In 2022, she received her bachelor's degree in nursing from Clemson University.
She was at work at AnMed in the spring of 2024 when she got a call on her cellphone from a Minneapolis number six years after she swabbed her cheek. Because she was working and she didn't recognize the number, she let the call go to voicemail.
Later, on a break, she was stunned to hear the message that was left.
'I got all the feels': Opportunity arises to help a man she might never know
She was a potential donor match for an older man in Europe.
If additional testing showed she was healthy enough and was a good medical match for him, Roberts could be a peripheral blood stem cell donor.
"Blood stem cells are blood-producing cells that create white and red blood cells as well as platelets," NMDP says on its website. "These stem cells can self-renew, meaning they can divide to produce more stem cells. Because of their versatility, they're vital for fighting a host of diseases and maintaining a healthy immune system. When these cells are found in circulating blood, they are referred to as 'peripheral blood stem cells.'"
Roberts said she never imagined that she would actually match with someone in need.
"I got all the feels," she said. "I got all the feels and the jitters. I just couldn't believe it."
The donation didn't happen right away. Roberts had to undergo additional medical testing to confirm she was, indeed, a good match.
After that initial call in the spring, weeks passed. Then months.
At one point, Roberts said she believed the potential recipient was going to back out of the process.
She has never seen him. She doesn't know his name or really much of anything about him. His identity is protected, Roberts said.
She didn't need to know him. She just wanted to help.
The gift of more time is a precious thing to give, nurse says
But as the months stretched on and no word came, Roberts guessed that the man had changed his mind.
"I was disappointed," she said. "I thought I was going to be able to help, but I just made peace with myself that I had done what I could do."
Then, as summer turned into fall, Roberts got another call from NMDP. The man who she would help had decided to move forward, and Roberts was his best medical match.
In October, Roberts was flown to Florida to donate blood stem cells. In the most basic of terms, here's how that worked for her:
In the days before the donation, Roberts was given medical injections so her body would produce more blood stem cells.
In Florida, she was hooked up to a machine that removed the extra blood stem cells her body had produced. It was an outpatient procedure and not a surgery. The procedure typically takes four to eight hours the day it is done.
A medical courier was nearby and put Roberts' donation on a plane to go to the recipient.
The extra blood stem cells that were produced by her body will essentially create a new immune system for the recipient.
"He'll even have my allergies and my blood type," she said.
Roberts said she experienced some minimal discomfort from giving the donation, and she especially remembers feeling sore for a while.
"I would still do it," she said. "Knowing what I know, I would do it again in a minute."
She may never know anything else about the man she helped.
"What I do think about is, 'What if what I did gives him 10 more years with his family?'" she said. "When my husband was sick, I would have given anything to know that we could have more time together as a family.
"I hope the person who received the donation has that - more time. I would give again in a minute, because I truly understand the gift of having more time."