Dash for Organ Donation

Some of you know that my sister, Gabriela, passed away on May 21^st of this year. After 3 kidney transplants and periods of years on dialysis since she was just 9 months, old she passed away due to intestinal blockages. 

My sisters’ first transplant was a kidney from my mom and her second was from a man who died in a motorcycle accident. The last, in 2007, was from a selfless, caring, amazing person who decided that she wanted to help save someone’s life by giving part of herself. 

Katie Welch, in her mid-twenties at the time, and my sister came into communication and Katie told my sister she would be willing to donate one of her kidneys to my sister out of the kindness of her heart. The word for this is altruistic. Not many people that I’ve encountered over the years know this word because there aren’t many people out there who truly are to the extent that Katie is. 

The kidney that Katie donated was strong and gave my sister 7 years of happiness. Seven years of extended life, of not having to go to dialysis three times a week. 

Now she is once again doing something so very kind. Katie will be participating in the Dash for Organ Donation in Alaska. She is raising money for Alaska Kidney Patients Association Inc.  on September 20^th. 

I know that we are all asked to donate money every time we turn around and that times are tough economically and we don’t all have much to spare. But if between now and the race in September you happen to have a few extra dollars ($1? $5? $10?) please consider donating it to Katie and the Alaska Kidney Patients. 

If you don’t personally know someone who is in need of an organ transplant you may not know the following facts:

• 18 people die daily while waiting for a transplant, 14 of which were waiting for a new kidney.
• 1 deceased organ donar can save up to 8 lives
• 122,737 (as of 5/21/14) men, women and children currently need organ transplants
• Of those 100,602 are waiting for a kidney transplant.
• Every 10 minutes a name is added to that list. 
• In 2014 there were 14,029 kidney transplants. 9,314 of those came from deceased donors and 4,715 came from living donors. 
• In 2014 there was only 1 unrelated anonymous donation (like my sisters’). 

Thank you for reading this. If you have a moment to share on your blog or tweet about this it would be incredible. 

It's not typical confessions... but I confess I would love for you to help! 

Throwback Thursday: I wanted to be....

I almost skipped this week’s prompt – only because I haven’t been able to catch up on my life and not doing it seemed a lot easier than sitting down and actually thinking about it.  However, as I sat at work Thursday I thought about it and decided that late will be better than never and this one is close to my heart these days.

Many of you will know, from previous posts, that my sister is currently in the ICU at Cedars Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. She is not doing too well at the moment due to intestinal issues. But before she had intestinal problems she had chronic kidney problems. My sister got sick at 9 months and has had 3 transplants in her 42 years of life. I was born when she was 12 ½ years old, and 3 years before she got her 2^nd transplant.

Because I grew up around hospitals and doctors there was only one thing that I wanted to be when I grew up: a “kidney doctor” so I could cure my sister. This is actually written somewhere, in some book, by my mom. Now I know they are called “nephrologists” but back then I simply saw them as “kidney doctors”.

Unfortunately I was never smart enough to be a doctor, not even close, but luckily my sister has had some of the best doctors out there and kidney-wise is doing perfectly, after receiving a 3^rd kidney in 2006 (19 years after the 2^nd one). If I were little now I would probably want to be a surgeon that could take care of my sister’s intestinal hole.

Instead of being a doctor I got a degree in Journalism and then a teaching credential. I am doing neither, instead I am working the public sector as what is basically a social worker (but not nearly as nice). I love my job, though, so it worked out in the end.