It is National Donate Life Month and sharing the stories of those who make life happen inspires us to continue serving our mission. Organ, eye and tissue donation happens every day because of all types of heroic donors. A living organ donation happens when a healthy person donates an organ or part of an organ for transplantation. Most living donors donate one of their kidneys or a portion of their liver. Living organ donors make thousands of transplants possible every year. Living donors can be friends, loved ones, relatives or even individuals who wish to remain anonymous and they spare a potential recipient a long and uncertain wait. According to the United Network of Organ Sharing (UNOS), in 2023, more than 6,900 transplants were made possible by living donors.
Meet Michelle, an Advocate for Life and altruistic living kidney donor. This means she did not know the person she donated her kidney to. It has always fascinated her how one small, split-second choice can change our lives so drastically or how one seemingly inconsequential action on the most normal day suddenly becomes an action to look back on for the rest of our life. For Michelle, that happened on 7/2/2019. She was on her lunch break at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV) and, as she did every day, Michelle visited the gym to get a small cardio and weight workout in. She often scrolled Reddit while on the treadmill as it made the time go by a little faster. It was that moment, on a normal Tuesday, that Michelle clicked on a Reddit thread titled, “I donated my kidney to an anonymous stranger, ask me anything!”
Michelle went on to read the story that inspired her to learn more about living kidney donation and become a living kidney donor. She read about this stranger’s journey, their hesitations, their testing process, their surgery experience and their life quality after donation. Michelle remembers thinking, “We can do that? We can just tell a transplant center to give our kidney to whoever needs it?” She was, at the time, not very educated about kidney donation and transplantation. Michelle was always under the assumption that donating a kidney was an arduous, life altering process that only happened because someone we love was in danger of losing their own life without a new kidney. She was truly shocked to hear the opposing reality that this stranger online experienced and that thousands of living donors across the nation have also experienced. They weren’t left with an unsightly two-foot-long scar up their back. They weren’t spending every day carefully watching what they ate and avoiding all junk food. They weren’t living in fear that their remaining kidney could fail at any second and they’d be knocking on death’s door. This stranger on Reddit, and many other strangers who commented to give their stories, were living very normal and fulfilling lives after donating. The best part was that others, with their new kidney(s), were now doing the same.
Michelle estimated about thirty minutes elapsed from opening that Reddit thread to the confirmation email she received from The National Kidney Registry, informing her that her donor screen questionnaire had been submitted. About one year later, on 7/1/2020, Michelle would be donating a kidney to a stranger at the University of California, San Diego. The process moved quite quickly. Before Michelle knew it, she was speaking on the phone with a representative at The National Kidney Registry. She remembers talking about her reasoning for wanting to donate a kidney, and having a hard time putting into words how she felt it was simply her duty as someone who was fortunate enough to be born with a healthy, illness-free body to help someone who didn’t receive that same fortune. Michelle certainly wasn’t more worthy of health than those in kidney failure. She felt simply lucky that she was born with two kidneys that worked optimally throughout her childhood and now adulthood. The representative spent a lot of time going over statistical numbers of one-kidney quality of life and, as someone who had just completed a statistic heavy graduate program, Michelle really appreciated seeing the hard numbers. They assured her that she would only be approved to donate if they could be as sure as possible that it wouldn’t cause complications for her down the road.
As Michelle’s testing progressed, she became more and more confident in her decision to donate, as did her loved ones. It seems that every part of Michelle’s body was analyzed carefully and compassionately (from her mental health to her heart, lungs and of course kidneys themselves). She talked to dozens of advocates and health professionals. Michelle knew she was in good hands and that if this team approved her donation, it was because she was an ideal candidate to not only help someone, but to continue to live a perfectly full life. Michelle remembers flying to San Diego for her day of consultations and testing with the transplant center team. As she sat in waiting rooms for all of her tests, Michelle made note of the new signage warning patients of an emerging respiratory virus. It was 1/7/2020 and she was officially approved to donate on 1/15/2020. One month later, panic started to spread about the COVID virus, and two months later, the world shut down. With COVID running rampant, Michelle’s donation was put on pause. Her team was unsure when elective surgeries would resume, so she patiently waited until early May and finally received a call that they were again moving forward with her living donation process. Michelle gave more blood to send off to the National Kidney Registry and less than one week later, Michelle had her match. Surgery was officially scheduled for 7/1/2020 and she felt such a mix of excitement and nerves - this was really happening! Michelle began telling her family and friends. She also started the process for Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) leave with her job, booked her trip and patiently waited for surgery day.
Michelle and her husband flew to San Diego in late June 2020, where they were greeted with gorgeous weather and her incredible transplant team. They spent a few days lounging by the pool in between her pre-op testing and meetings. On 7/1/2020, Michelle’s kidney was on a one-way journey to the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) to be shared with her perfect match. To this day, Michelle knows nothing about who received her kidney. Michelle only knows that the surgery was successful, and the kidney began working immediately. Michelle thinks about her anonymous recipient often and hopes they are still doing well. She had a very tough recovery. Michelle’s body didn’t react very well to having a vital organ removed and she spent an extra night in the hospital as she was unable to keep food down. Michelle was in so much pain and no amount of Zofran curbed the nausea, but at no time in her suffering did she regret her choice. After checking out of the hospital, Michelle recovered one more week in the hotel before heading home to Las Vegas. It was at that one-week mark that she finally felt like a human being again. Walking was no longer a daunting task, food was once again appetizing and Michelle stayed awake throughout the day. It was a quick recovery from there. Michelle was doing low impact cardio workouts with her doctor’s approval two weeks after surgery.
Nearly five years later and at 32 years of age, Michelle is proudly part of the statistic of living donors with a fantastic quality of life. Her bloodwork is perfect, and her remaining kidney has picked up the slack flawlessly. Michelle talks about her donation proudly in hopes of inspiring others to learn more about it (just as that stranger on Reddit did for her). She’s currently training for her first half and full marathons. Michelle is consistently impressed with the things her body can do. Michelle’s dream and ultimate goal is to run the New York City Marathon while spreading awareness for living organ donation. Michelle knows firsthand what the power of sharing experiences can do, and she plans to share Her's with anyone willing to listen. Are you inspired? Learn more about living donation here!