Membranoproliferative Glomerulonephritis is the disease which required me to have a kidney transplant. It took me a long time to memorize the name!
My disease was diagnosed in February of 1993 and it took until 2009 for me to need to be put onto the transplant waiting list or begin dialysis. I was pretty freaked out about going on dialysis because of my active lifestyle. I envisioned having to purchase an RV with electrical so that I could hook up periodialysis and continue camping and hiking!
I was fortunate enough to be on the waiting list for only two months shy of a year. Although I had never had surgery and was nervous about it, it turned out to be a breeze. My surgery took only 1-1/2 hours because I was in good shape. The doctors and nurses were awesome and it really wasn’t bad being in the hospital – they brought three meals a day, and most of the time I never had time to even get hungry!
I won’t get into what happened a couple months after that because it had nothing to do with the transplant and everything to do with the meds. Now I feel great and I’m even more active than I was before. Life is more than good — it’s fantastic. Thank you to my donor and his family and my entire transplant team, doctors and surgeons.
