“When a former colleague was awaiting a kidney transplant I knew within minutes that I would offer one of mine”
As soon as I learnt that Sonia was on the waiting list for a kidney, I knew instantly that it was something I wanted to do. I was actually one of her students when I was studying Diagnostic Radiography. She was always an excellent teacher, and I knew in my heart that I wanted to donate as soon as I found out about what she was going through. It was an easy decision.
It started one day when I saw on Facebook her sister had uploaded a picture of a card and some flowers from her colleagues at Kings thanking them for their kind gesture. I texted Sonia to ask how she was and she told me more about her kidney disease. She explained how she had lived with it since she was 25 and was just starting dialysis, which she was finding very overwhelming and emotional.
I asked if she had found a donor yet, but she explained had been on the transplant waiting list for two years. I had donated blood before this and knew my own blood type, so I asked what her blood type was in case we shared the same one. Her type was the same as mine. It felt like fate. I immediately remembered how lovely she was to her students, and I knew immediately what the right thing to do was. That’s when I told her I would begin testing to see if I could be a donor for her.
There were a number of tests and scans, which I honestly found quite overwhelming at first. My living donor coordinator sat down with me for our first meeting and went through everything involved for about an hour. When they were done, she took my blood pressure, and it was through the roof because of everything she’d told me! We were able to chat through everything a bit more and I had time to go away and do my own research, which really helped me understand everything going on and what to expect.
In the end, I was found to be a match for her. I’m not a religious person, but it felt like fate. It felt right.
The operation happened in Guy’s Hospital on May 30, 2017. Sonia went into hospital the day before me, while I got there for 7:00am. They came to take me down to theatre first. I said goodbye to Sonia, and we both started crying. The emotions were certainly very high!
The operation itself went off without a hitch. When I woke up, I remember seeing her being wheeled into recovery. It was wonderful to see, but I was definitely still nervous about her operation had gone. I asked the sonographer who had come to do a kidney scan on Sonia if everything went well, and he told me she was fine. It was such a relief to hear that!
At first Sonia wasn’t sure if she wanted to share her story widely as she didn’t want people to feel needlessly sorry for her, but after the operation we both knew that we wanted to share our experiences so that other people could hear what we went through, and realise how easy it is to become a donor.
Sonia’s twin sister was also on the kidney transplant list with the same hereditary illness, polycystic kidney disease. After five years on the waiting list, having dialysis three times a week for eight hours at a time, last July she received a kidney from a deceased donor.
There are over 6,000 people on the waiting list for a kidney in the UK at the moment. There are so many misconceptions out there about how you can’t live a normal life after donating a kidney, but that’s just not true. I can still do everything I could do before my donation. I’m still living a healthy and normal life with one kidney. If anything, I’m healthier now because I’m aware of my own body in a way that I never was before. I make sure to stay hydrated and I go to the gym more. Donating a kidney can sound difficult, but the reality of it is that donating a kidney is nowhere near as bad as it sounds.
The whole experience has been life enriching beyond anything I could ever describe. Of all the things I’ve ever done in my life this has definitely been the happiest.
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