REV. JAMES D. BURWELL, JOU-AL BURWELL, GABRI-ELLE BURWELL
I plan on living long and living strong,’ Lady J says
As you’re reading this, Jou-AL Burwell, also known as “Lady J,” is probably at home or outside playing with her precious daughter, Gabri-Elle, who is 6.
Or maybe “Lady J” is attending a council meeting in Homestead. After all, she’s a borough council member.
Or maybe she’s at Clark Memorial Baptist Church, in Homestead, on Glenn Street. Her husband is the longtime pastor, Rev. James D. Burwell. They’ve been married for 15 years.
In May 2025, she’ll turn 50, and she’s excited for it and what comes thereafter.
“It will be my golden year,” Jou-AL Burwell told the New Pittsburgh Courier, July 18. “I plan on living long and living strong.”
On Friday, July 26, she’ll definitely be at Clark Memorial Baptist Church for a 7:30 p.m. evening concert, where vocalists like the Grammy-nominated Travis Malloy, Deborah Moncrief, Kim Lankford and Zanetta Butler will perform. Sydni Goldman of Cornerstone Television Network will host. Tickets are $35.
And it’s all for “Lady J.”
Doctors told Jou-AL Burwell in November 2022 that she had stage four kidney failure (disease). Three times per week, every week, for almost the past two years, Burwell has undergone kidney dialysis. Each time, it’s three and a half hours.
In March 2024, she went public with the diagnosis. Since then, there’s been an outpouring of support for Burwell, and plenty of people have tried to be a live kidney donor, but that’s when some of the roadblocks form. For some people, they’re the wrong blood type. For most, though, they couldn’t pass the strict criteria to be a donor, such as one’s Body Mass Index being too high, or suffering from high blood pressure.
On UPMC’s website, it lists that a living kidney donor should have normal blood pressure, normal results of tests such as chest x-ray, EKG, and routine age appropriate testing, a normal cardiac stress test if over age 50, normal lab values and a normal kidney anatomy.
Oftentimes, those under age 18 and over 65 count as disqualifiers, in addition to a history of an autoimmune disorder such as lupus, or infectious diseases such as hepatitis, etc.
JOU-AL BURWELL
Jou-AL Burwell’s blood type is A Positive. She’s looking for a living kidney donor of that blood type, or the universal blood type, which is O. So far, no luck. Which is why she’s hoping that someone in the region might step up and be a match, and be “just what the doctor ordered.”
“Be open-minded to it,” Jou-AL Burwell told the Courier. “You could be my second chance at life. I would love to spend more time with my daughter, with my husband. Be open-minded and think about if it was your mother or your child, what would you want done.”
Jou-AL Burwell could get a kidney from someone who is deceased. But doctors have told her it would be a much better situation if the kidney came from a living person. If it comes from a living person, the surgery could be scheduled within weeks, and onward we go. But when it comes to a kidney from someone deceased, the call from doctors could come in weeks, months, or tomorrow at 3 in the morning.
“If there was one available for me and they call me at 3 o’clock in the morning with a kidney from a deceased person, I would take it,” Jou-AL Burwell told the Courier, her spirits high. “And then if there was a match that came along (living), I would put that as my ace in the hole for another time if the deceased kidney didn’t last.”
Those who are interested in being a living donor must call UPMC’s Living Donor Kidney Line at 412-647-4438. Then give the recipient’s name, Jou-AL Robinson Burwell.
Jou-AL Burwell told the Courier that God has been with her the whole way. Even before the kidney failure, she called her daughter Gabri-Elle her “miracle baby,” born at just 1 pound. Six years later, Gabri-Elle is healthy and thriving.
“Spiritually, my hopes have been very high,” Jou-AL Burwell told the Courier. “We just believe in God for a miracle at this point. I have a strong faith in the word of God, and His word says that by His stripes, I am already healed. So that’s what I’m standing on and that’s what I’m believing.”
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