My kidneys are dead.

I found this out almost two years ago when my body completely shut down and I died.

Cleveland Clinic did an amazing job bringing me back under conditions that were absolutely devastating and seemingly insurmountable. Heart failure. Liver failure. Kidney failure.

The picture down below on this page gives a list of nearly everything that went wrong over the course of 7 weeks.

After leaving the hospital I could not walk. Raising my arm above my head was impossible. A skin condition developed called calciphylaxis. If there is anything more painful in this world, it doesn't exist yet. It was constant. The mortality rate is 80%, but I pressed on. My immune system was so beaten that I developed skin cancer as well. The only reason I am not confined to a bed, unable to walk and function is because I forced myself to become active again. Things got better because I made them better.

My kidneys are the one organ that could not recover. I knew this very early on in the hospital, and accepted it as a new challenge. I have to be on dialysis for the rest of my life. For 4 hours, three times each week, my blood is taken out and put through a machine that filters it. It's an amazing process, but it is only a band-aid. Without this, toxins would build up in my blood and I would die within a week.

Dialysis can be incredibly debilitating, and it is said that the stress on the body is the equivalent of running a 26-mile marathon three days each week. I'm doing pretty good despite all this, but problems still pop up out of nowhere. The risk of death is always still there.

30% of people waiting for a kidney die before receiving a transplant.

The only thing that would cure all this is a new kidney. Due to the kidney exchange program, that matches criteria such as blood type, sometimes one donor can set off a chain reaction where 25 lives are saved.

All it takes is the right person seeing this.

If anyone has, or finds an extra kidney that isn't being used, I'd like to be friends with it.

Elder HS Class of 1999

Why I Need A Kidney
From A Living Donor

DECEASED DONOR VERSUS LIVING DONOR:
I'm on the list for a kidney from a Deceased Donor, people who designate that they want to be an organ donor upon death. But it takes about 5-8 years to get to the top of that list, and a kidney from a Deceased Donor typically doesn’t last as long as a kidney from a Living Donor. So I'm searching for a Living Donor, someone who is willing to “share a spare” kidney. Each person who needs a transplant has to find their own Living Kidney Donor; there is no list for that.

The donor evaluation for Living Donors is very thorough, and the transplant team only chooses healthy people to donate. Interestingly, there are studies that show that typically Donors live longer than people who don’t donate.

KIDNEY DONATION BASICS:
The most important factor for kidney donation is that the Donor is healthy enough to donate, and only the Transplant Team can decide that. With the option of Paired Exchange, your blood type isn’t critical. Sometimes, people who want to donate aren’t the best match for the person they’re trying to help. So the transplant team can arrange a “swap” with another Donor/Recipient pair. That's called a Paired Exchange.

What are the steps? The first step to seeing if you are qualified to donate your kidney, would be to complete the online questionnaire by clicking on "Start the Donor Screening Process". Then, you will need to get some basic bloodwork at your local lab. Once the Transplant Team has your lab results, they can tell you if you’re a possible match and what the next steps are.

How You Can Help

By sharing my story to your group of family and friends, you help to increase the number of people who may consider kidney donation.

You can also support me and other patients in need of a transplant by being screened to become a kidney donor with the National Kidney Registry. The process is easy to complete and potential donors have access to the NKR’s nationwide donor support network.

The buttons at the top and bottom of this page are the most direct ways to get more information They include explanation of the transplant process and initial screening. It's extremely easy to use and there's no commitment. Simply answer a few questions and plug my name in when prompted. Scroll down and pick Cleveland Clinic as the transplant center. Potential donors are protected by a program called Donor Shield. Donor Shield ensures wage and expense reimbursement, and many other benefits.

Donate a kidney, get a paid vacation.