My son spent a lot of time in hospitals as a child. More than once we saw room mates (or their families) throw a project linus quilt into the trash as they were checking out. Who knows why. Maybe they didn't particularly like it or it had bad memories associated with it. Maybe they had limited space at home. Maybe it was soiled and they didn't want to take home hospital germs. One of the nurses would take them out of the trash, wash them in a laundromat, and donate them to animal shelters, which I think is better than a landfill, but I did wonder how a quilter would feel potentially seeing a quilt they made being used for an animal shelter.
The bottom line is, you have to give a gift and release your sense of control. The recipient will do what they do.