CARY – Cary resident Julie Magnini has received a stomach, duodenum, small intestine and pancreas transplant after being on a waiting list for more than two years.

The hardest part of her journey has been being away from home, Magnini said. She has had to make regular trips to the Cleveland Clinic, and will now stay in Ohio for up to six months as she recovers.

“I think it’s a new normal, but a better normal,” Magnini said of life after surgery.

Magnini had made an arrangement with a pilot to fly her to the hospital at a moment’s notice when organs were available. Magnini said she had a couple of “dry runs,” where she went to the clinic ready for surgery, only to find the organs weren’t a good match.

However, on Memorial Day, Magnini already was in Cleveland, for a regular appointment when she received a call from the clinic saying they had found a match.

After waiting about six hours for the organs to arrive, she underwent the 18-hour transplant surgery. Magnini has been in the hospital since then, but hopes to move Monday to an apartment for transplant patients near the hospital. Family and friends are taking shifts to stay with Magnini, who needs someone with her 24 hours a day.

Eventually, Magnini will be able to eat regularly again. A 2007 gastric bypass is what led to her case of gastroparesis. Since 2012, Magnini has lived without a stomach, receiving necessary nutrients by way of a bag that connects to her small intestine.

Magnini’s husband, Cary-Grove High School music teacher Marty Magnini, was at the hospital with her on Thursday.

Throughout the process, the Magnini family – including 21-year-old daughter Toni and 16-year-old son Miles – have learned to be a “glass half full kind of family,” Marty Magnini said. During the school year, Marty, Toni and Miles would live at home in Cary and make trips to see Julie in Ohio.

“Now that the transplant has happened, there’s an end in sight,” Marty Magnini said.

Expenses for the Magnini’s trips back and forth to Cleveland and the cost of travel and living expenses for full-time caregivers have cost the family thousands of dollars, Julie Magnini said.

The help from family, friends and strangers has been overwhelming, Julie Magnini said. The original YouCaring page set up for the family raised more than $17,000, and now a new page to support the family after Julie Magnini's transplant has raised more than $6,000. Donations can be made at www.youcaring.com/juliemagnini-836117.

A fundraiser, Jammin' for Julie, is set for 5 to 9 p.m. Aug. 2 at Lions Park, 1200 Silver Lake Road, Cary. More information can be found on the event's Facebook page, www.facebook.com/events/140655746503421/.

“We wouldn’t have been able to make it this far without the help of everyone,”Julie Magnini said.

Some days, Julie Magnini said she has “pity parties,” but then she stops and reminds herself of an important fact.

“I’m alive, and somebody else isn’t. So I need to take this gift and do the best I can with it,” she said.