Nine years ago today, Babygirl got her new kidney. Miraculous, life altering, amazing, wonderful. It's all of those things. It ended a terrible era of freedom limiting dialysis and suffering. We are grateful.
It began a lot of other things: Immunosuppression. Headaches (both the literal and figurative type). Severe, undiagnosable infections and (thankfully mild and reversible) rejection episodes. All of these have been controlled.
But it began something more subtle. A countdown. The life expectancy of a transplanted deceased donor kidney is 10-16 years (add 5 more if the donor is living). The record so far celebrated 50 years in 2019. He was a 72 year old man in England who's brother donated a kidney to him when they were young (the brother later died of a heart attack at age 38!).
No matter. We don't know. Babygirl does an absolutely amazing job taking care of Jorge's kidney. I met another fairly young transplant reipient recently, and she is quite pleased, after 6 years, that her creatinine is 1.4. Jorge's is 0.8, which is excellent. (In case you aren't sure, lower is better. And 1.4 is early kidney failure, no matter how you look at it. Babygirl is doing well. But 10 years? One left. Sixteen? Then 7. Fifty? Well, we don't have England's National Health Service, but barring any gaps in care? It's something to shoot for.
DeeDee
