That’s right, you read that title correctly, Amanda was listed last Tuesday and got a call late last night that they had a kidney for her. We don’t know much other than she has to be at the hospital by noon today. I am back in Texas right now, waiting to hop on a jet plane to get to her. That may be confusing to some, since I know many thought I was still in Tennessee, so let me catch you up real quick.
We assumed that when Amanda called the kidney team once we were back in Tennessee, she would be listed right away. That’s what we were led to believe, but it wasn’t true. They needed some labs for cross-matching with a donor first. They also wanted info from our oncology visit regarding her low white count. This was all the information the coordinator already had, but hadn’t passed on. Then they wanted to wait for the surgeon’s clearance. The surgeon had questions about Amanda’s BP meds. After the surgeon raised concerns during our evaluation, the heart team eased Amanda down to taking them only before dialysis sessions. The coordinator knew this and had been informed, but she isn’t very good at reading charts in general, much less her own notes! We’d had issues like this before. So we waited through the weekend to get word.
My original plan was to leave Sunday after church and stay at my aunt’s on the way home, but I decided to stay an extra night with Amanda and leave early Monday morning. I rolled out at 3 am on the dot in my Suburban, which was backed into by another tenant in the complex a few days before, but that story is for another day! I only stopped twice and made it in exactly 15 hours, my best time yet. I had a few things to take care of for our long-term Airbnb guest, then got home to wind down and get a nap. My phone rang with a call from the railroad around 1 am. I was dog-tired after the long drive and only a few hours of sleep, but off to work I went. A week later, and I’m not sure I’ve caught up on sleep yet!
Later that morning, while I was at work, I got a text from Amanda that she was listed. Turned out our BP meds and oncology report weren’t issues after all, once they had the notes, which the coordinator had all along. Amanda was scheduled to start home dialysis the following Monday, and I planned to drive back up after finishing the month out with work. Turns out it was training that started Monday. 3-4 weeks of 4-day-a-week training, that is, we had no clue! Since I was going back so quickly to be there when Amanda started dialysis at home, my return was pushed till late March.
That brings me to today. I was called in to work at 8 pm last night. I was chasing a train down that was halfway to Alpine, so I was in a van with spotty cell service in the West Texas hills when I got a text from Amanda. It read “We have a kidney! I’m still on the phone with the coordinator….” I read the first bit, then called. As I read the rest, I hung up. I barely had service, and when I mentioned what was going on to my engineer, he quickly told the driver to pull over so we wouldn’t lose what service we had. We waited for a bit. I wanted confirmation before I called in and tuned around. Finally, I told the driver, “Back to Del Rio,” and I started making phone calls and sending texts.
Once Amanda got off the phone with the coordinator, she called me. It was confirmed pending ‘eyes on’ verification that the kidney was viable. She needed to be at the hospital by noon. The donor was local and at Vanderbilt. Their OR time for procurement was at 8 am. We don’t know much more about the donor, who is brain dead and in their early 50s. This is the hard part about all of this, especially for Amanda. A family in Nashville is devastated right now after making one of the toughest decisions for their loved one. Though we, along with countless others listed for various organs, are all elated right now, there is a family going through the very opposite. Please pray for them.
As I rode back on the hour-and-a-half ride with spotty service most of the way. I chatted with Amanda on and off, through dropped calls. I booked the first direct flight out of San Antonio to Nashville between cell service windows. Amanda mentioned that the Kidney Donor Profile Index (KDPI) score was 50. The lower the better, meaning better quality and a likely longer lifespan. The 50 was a pretty good score, according to the coordinator. 40-80 is the range they mostly deal with for adult transplants. The 50 also meant this kidney had a lifespan about 50% longer than the average. So we are looking at possibly 15 years with this kidney. After the last year and a half, a break for 15 minutes sounds wonderful, much less 15 years! I pray it lasts that long or longer.
Once I got off work, I talked to Amanda most of my 30-minute drive home as she packed and got ready. I was in packing mode once I got home, too. I didn’t need much; I had left a pretty good stash in our apartment. After I took a minute to catch my breath, I checked my flight confirmation to check in; it was delayed, and I was moved to standby. Not a typical 5-10-minute delay, but a 3-hour delay, putting me there at noon. That wasn’t going to work. I’d already looked at Austin before to see if they had anything earlier, so I knew I had options. I swapped to a flight out of AUS only 25 minutes later, but an hour farther drive, and with nowhere free to park, I was planning on leaving my Suburban at the depot in San Antonio until I flew back in.
I swapped the flight and took off about midnight for my four-hour drive, and a 7:25 am departure out of Austin. I took it easy since I had plenty of time. I really hadn’t had a moment to just soak it in alone. I started to pray a prayer of thanksgiving. At work, I had been putting my boring trips to good use, using the time to memorize scripture. One of my recent verses popped to mind. “LORD, you are my God; I will exalt you and praise your name, for in perfect faithfulness you have done wonderful things, things planned long ago. ~ Isaiah 25:1 I took a bit to just pray that verse back to the Lord on my drive.
‘Perfect faithfulness’ really resonated with me on this verse. God may not have answered our ‘heal the kidneys without a transplant’ prayer, but He sure got to work on moving things along on the list! God’s faithfulness is perfect, His timing is always perfect, because He is perfect. We know God will use this for His good; we’ve seen Him do it time and time again, and we’ll see Him do it again. We are trusting in Him fully.
I don’t think Amanda got much sleep. I talked to her for a while on my drive to Austin, all while she was packing. Last time I talked to her, it was 4 am, and she’d just gotten into bed. I’m not going to get a wink of sleep. I can sleep in a car easily or knock out on a train at work, but not so much on planes. I think it’s a height thing! Amanda is picking me up as soon as I land, then we’ll head to the apartment for a bit before heading to the hospital. The coordinator said to plan for five days inpatient because of Amanda’s prior heart transplant. However, she did say that it could be less than that.
I’ll be back to posting here regularly, so check back for updates. We’d appreciate prayers that the kidney is viable and that the surgery goes smoothly. Also, that the new kidney will wake up quickly, there won’t be any need for dialysis, and Amanda will be peeing like crazy!
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