In early September 2007, I was at my parents' house and something was wrong. My head felt "full" -- I couldn't collect my thoughts or concentrate on anything. I went to my primary-care physician when I got home and he immediately set up an appointment with a kidney specialist. My blood pressure was no longer controllable with the regimen I was on -- it had finally gone right off the charts.
At any time, somewhere from 20 to 25 percent of the body's blood supply is going through the kidneys. That's why high blood pressure is such a good early indicator of kidney disease. At the specialist's office, I found out my disease had progressed to the point that I had somewhere under 30 percent function in my kidneys. Not a good thing to find out a day away from your 40th birthday.
I'd always expected to follow the same basic pattern as my father: a busy work and home life, early retirement and then onto dialysis and to a transplant, maybe in my mid- to late 50s.
So much for that plan. I'd have to either go on dialysis while I was still working and wait for a transplant.
As difficult as it was to live with knowledge of this disease over the past 13 years, this was devastating. How would I even be able to keep working while on dialysis? With waits of 5-7 years for cadaver kidneys, would I even make it?
I'd heard about living donation -- the kinds of people who simply want to help and sign themselves up on a list to donate a kidney. But I figured those should go to either children or people with parents.
Little did I know what was coming.
