Calling Karma! Your assistance is needed on aisle one!

Back in March of this year I went to UCLA and was tested to be a kidney donor for my boss, and good friend, Kelly. Two other girls from my office also went and were tested at the same time. Against some serious odds, we were all determined to be a match. One girl, we’ll call her Lisa, was a slightly better match than the other two of us, so it was decided that she’d go through with the rest of the testing. (UCLA will only have one person in the donor program (per recipient) at a time, due to costs of the tests). So Lisa did all her tests and passed. But at the same time, she’d decided to stop working for us and go into the sheriff’s academy. Supposedly, she told the department that she was going to be a donor, and they were all fine and dandy with it, as long as it was done after graduation. So surgery was scheduled for December 19th. She’d missed her last appointment for one reason or another, but had called Friday and said she’d absolutely be at the one scheduled for yesterday, even if she had to call in sick to her work. Except she lied, and didn’t show up. She left a voice mail finally, saying that she just couldn’t do it, she had her kids to think of, she was still young, etc. I understand being scared. I understand needing to put your kids first before everything else. What I don’t understand is how someone can wait until a week before the surgery is scheduled to say "Oh, hey, can’t do it, sorry!" That just infuriates me. If she couldn’t do it, she shouldn’t have dragged this out for 6 months. She should have said a long time ago that this wasn’t something you could commit to. It’s not like she didn’t know how old she was, or that she had kids depending on her. (although, her kids mean SO MUCH to her, that she shipped them out of state to stay with relatives while she did the academy. But I’m not a mom, so what do I know?) I’m just so pissed that she could do that to Kelly and feel fine about it. At the VERY least, she should have come in and talked to Kelly in person. You’re gonna back out, nut up and do it in person, don’t leave a fucking voice mail. (Or "ovary up" in this case, but that doesn’t have the same ring to it). I hope karma kicks her right in the kidney.

So this morning I called UCLA to schedule an appointment to continue testing for kidney donation. If all goes well, I’ll be giving Kelly my kidney in a couple months. When I first offered to get tested to do this, I did a TON of research on kidney donation. I know that there’s a 0.03% chance I could die in surgery. I know that there’s a 23% chance I’ll get some sort of infection, and have to stay in the hospital for up to a week. There is little that I don’t know about it. Even armed with all this knowledge, I’m still terrified. All the "what ifs?" keep running through my head. I could die. I could get very sick. Kelly’s body could reject the kidney totally, and the surgery would have been for nothing. And yet no part of me wants to back out. I want more than anything to give her this kidney. She’s a great person, and great friend, and it’s been so hard watching her be sick so often, or knowing that she has to sit in a chair for 3+ hours so the dialysis can clean out her blood three days a week. It’s hard knowing that she’s been waiting for a kidney for so long, and her brother got one in no time at all. I only wish I’d done the research sooner, and offered to donate 3 years ago when I found out she needed a kidney. Better late than never, I guess.