There is a Ramones song, something of a balm for the broken hearted perhaps, in which Joey Ramone intones: "Indian giver/Indian giver/you took your love away from me/Indian giver/Indian giver/Took back the love you gave to me.''
It's a concept that the New York surgeon Richard Batista, 49, is currently grappling with. Not only is he a man with a self-proclaimed broken heart in the middle of divorce proceedings, but he wants to take back one of the most important gifts he ever bestowed on his estranged wife – his kidney.
Batista is asking for $1.5m (£980,000) compensation in lieu of the kidney, which he donated in 2001 - after 10 years of marriage.
His wife, Dawnell, 44, had undergone two failed kidney transplants before discovering that her husband was a 1-in-700,000 match. Donating his kidney allowed her to skip the waiting list of 6,748 people in New York state, according to a report in the New York Daily News.
At the time, their relationship had started to encounter some problems, but, he said: "She was my wife. My priority was to save her life, save her life and future of our children and hopefully with that in mind keep the marriage alive.''
All went well, and post recovery, Dawnell Batista embarked on a masters degree and a karate course. It was during this time, her estranged husband alleges, that his wife started an affair with a physical therapist she met while recovering from a knee injury sustained during karate lessons.
"There is no deeper pain you can ever express than to be betrayed by the person you devoted your life to. I saved her life, but the pain is unbearable."
His lawyer, Dominic Barbara, said a legal claim such as this is unprecedented in New York. "In theory we are asking for the return of the kidney. Of course, he wouldn't really ask for that, but the value of it."
Or, as one blogger, Summer Johnson, put it on bioethics.net:
"Many divorces turn acrimonious, but a New York divorce has turned potentially life-threatening."
It seems a new litmus test has emerged for real acrimony: has your soon-to-be ex asked for a donated organ back? Only then do you know you are in a truly deadly divorce.
