Study with qualitative approach that aimed at analyzing the experience lived for family members during the process of heart transplantation of their relatives. It was carried through in the Unit of Transplantation and Heart Failure - UTIC of the Hospital of Messejana, in Fortaleza-Ceará, with seven family members. The speeches were obtained through interviews, and classified in categories: describing the occured changes, promoting the adaptation for the provision of care, and discovering and living deeply solidarity. The analysis suggests that the heart transplantion generates changes, crises and moments of desestruturation, and that not only the person is shaken, but also the familiar net that make efforts to be adapted to the new situation.
Family relations; Heart transplantation; Life change events; Nursing