Kidney Disease Transplant: My Family's Journey
by Michael Lang, UNH Alum, Class of 2006
I’m finally in my room, high on the tenth floor of the recovery building. Like a monstrous creation of Dr. Frankenstein, I have a central line in my neck, a tube in my belly, and a tube in a place that I’d rather no doctor ever go near. An antibody called ATG is circulating through my veins. Powerful immunosuppressants are wreaking havoc on my white blood cells. The counter on the IV stand says that I need twenty more minutes. The alarm will sound. One of the nurses will hurry to change the bag and I’ll be on fluid for the rest of the night. Fluids in and fluids out. They’ll measure it, empty it, measure it, and then I’ll be left alone for a few hours.
I’ve just received a kidney from my older brother. He’s somewhere down the hall. The last time I saw him, I was in the bed waiting to go into surgery. The doctors wheeled his bed past mine. A quick high-five, a smile, a “see you when I wake up,” and Eric was whisked away. I wasn’t as frightened as I thought I would be. An hour with dad’s ancient six-string on the couch before leaving home and I had felt ready. A slightly altered verse from the bible kept echoing through my mind.
“Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil for I am the baddest mother that walks the land.” To this day I cannot remember how the actual verse ends.
I had been nervous, but not frightened. That is until they wheeled me into that white sterile room, a peripheral IV in my arm pumping god only knows what into my body. They ask me to scoot myself on to the stainless steel table. The less than dignifying hospital gown and thin blanket are little comfort against the cold metal. That’s when I felt scared for the first time. Gazing up at blinding lights above as an enormous hand lowers a mask over my face.
“Is it too late to change my mind?” I wonder.
What are the options? Dialysis? I had passed out when the doctors had explained that option. Dialysis had meant no more backpacking, no more rock climbing, no more feeling the icy winter wind on a knife-edge mountain ridge, no more life. There is no other option. My eyelids grow heavy. The lights go out. My journey has begun.
