Living nondirected kidney donations are on the rise. Yet we know little about these donors' motivations, particularly their unconscious sources. Here we attempt to explore these sources from a Lacanian approach. We first turn to Lacanian theory. We offer an explication of key Lacanian concepts such as the master-signifier, desire, and object (a). We then present a portrait of a research participant who sat down for three interviews to discuss freely her reasons for donating a kidney nondirectedly. In the discussion that follows, we attend to two significant moments in the subject's interview: (a) the deployment of a master-signifier ("once I heard that") and (b) the donor's experience of disappointment and abandonment postsurgery. Grounded in a master-signifier and the subject's postsurgical experience, we offer an interpretation of the donated kidney as a metaphor for childbirth and conclude that nondirected donation may be, in this case, an unconscious attempt to deliver the imaginary phallic object to the (m)Other.
