This also marks a year of attempting to get on the transplant wait list and still not there.
Statistically, it also means one year down, four to go, as the average life span for patients on dialysis is five years. Every 90 minutes somewhere in America a patient who is on the kidney wait list dies, waiting for a kidney that never came. Of course, I am always expecting a miracle, and I have outlived the statistics before. That said, this is a serious matter, and I don't want to be six feet under and my friends are saying, "Boy, I never knew dialysis was a problem for Heidi. She seemed to be doing just fine."
And so, once again, I ask you to consider the following:
* If you are not a donor, please visit organdonor.gov to find out how you can sign a donor card in your state.
* If you are a donor, make sure you talk with your spouse, children, and loved ones about your post-mortem wishes. Make sure your doctor knows your wishes. So often families do not allow hospitals to use desperately needed organs from their deceased loved ones, even though the deceased signed donor cards when they were alive.
* Consider giving the gift of life. Transplants have a much better chance of success if they are performed with kidneys from living donors. Four friends have stepped forward to say they would donate a kidney to me, but two have been eliminated for incompatible blood types and one for health reasons. The fourth does not know her blood type. So if you feel so moved, please let me know. Knowing that four people think so much of me to offer me this precious gift sure means a lot. Their offers have given me hope during this very difficult year.
* Ask your friends and family if they are organ donors. If not, encourage them to sign donor cards.
Thank you so much. My life and the lives of more than 100,000 kidney patients around the country depend on everyone realizing that people are dying needlessly every day. You can do something to change that.
