Surgery

[LongIslandGirl114]

Hello,I’m New here! I’m about to have a Kidney transplant on. June 27th, My sister is my donor. My Coordinator is not easy to get a hold of. What should I expect after surgery?

[tas1kubra]

Hello Longisland

First of all congrats! Can you share more about your journey?

I have not had the transplant yet, but there are many people on this platform who can guide you through their experiences. I can only recommend to stay positive you are about to feel greater changes in your body, let your mind to be open this adventure, too!

I wish you the best, and looking forward to hearing your post-transplant story and being a hope for all of us

[Cleo0806 in reply to tas1kubra]

Look forward to feeling very grateful post op. Your recovery will be smooth. I donated by kidney so my son could get a transplant on 3/31/2022. We both have had no problems. Keep positive. You are about to receive a great gift!!!

[bakermaker222 in reply to tas1kubra]

Hi LongIsland girl. Is your age 14? I received a kidney 9/9/2019. The first thing I felt was being so grateful to wake up with a new kidney. My experience was very good. I would like to know more of your story. Your sister is an amazing person. I was lucky and experienced very little pain. Stay positive and I wish you the very best. Enjoy your new kidney. I have a good feeling you are going to be great and so is your sister. You guys will talk about this. when you grow old

[LongIslandGirl114 in reply to bakermaker222]

Hi, Im 43 not 14. It’s my dad’s birthday.

[bakermaker222 in reply to LongIslandGirl114]

I'm sorry. I wish you and your sister the very best.

[LongIslandGirl114 in reply to tas1kubra]

Hi, I was diagnosed with Diabetes & High blood pressure in 2018 but don’t know how long I had it before diagnosed. Then I got a stomach virus and my kidney levels got worse and kept getting worse. My doctor finally said you need a new kidney

[DexterLab]

Congratulations to you and immense thanks for donors like your sister.

Day of surgery, she will start an hour or so before you, as it take little time to get you ready to get the new kidney, while it takes time to remove her kidney. At my hospital, I went straight from the recovery room to the transplant care wing of the hospital. There was some pain, but not bad. The new kidney went to work right away and within 4 days I was back to good kidney function. They want you to drink lots of water to exercise the new kidney.

The fun part is all the testing. Lots of blood draws to check on the kidney and head off any rejection nonsense. They will be seeing you at least twice a week for a while then less frequently as you get further along. You can't drive or lift much until the incision heals, because they don't want you to get a hernia at the incision.

My experience was really smooth. Hope the same for you.

[Sister9555]

In my husband’s case, he received a different coordinator once he had his surgery and she has been great to work with us. This is BJH in St Louis, they have pre-transplant and post-transplant coordinators.

[larrymontague826]

I had a wonderful coordinator. She scheduled my tests around my dialysis treatments. Once I got my transplant she was no longer in the picture. My post transplant people took care of everything. I would bet that beings you have a transplant date, it is out of your cooridnatoris hands. Good Luck I wish you the best.

[Lifechanger1]

Had my transplant 2 years ago, June 2nd. My son was my donor. I am in better shape now then I’ve ever been! I had to go on dialysis for three months. My original surgery date of 3/2/2020. But Covid came and the hospital shut all surgery down. Had to wait till 6/2/2020 to get surgery. It was a crazy time! Surgery went great, recovery time as expected and I’ve been walking two miles a day, with a day occasionally day off, while following my coordinator’s and Dr orders. My blood numbers have been the best they’ve been in years. Just stay positive, think about your life changing for the better. There are many contacts you have at your disposal to get in touch with on this site that have first hand experience. Wishing you all the best!

[Herkidney]

Congratulations!! Everyone has different experiences as you know. Some people will be able to go home after 3 days in the hospital and some people need to stay longer after surgery (I was there for 8 days). The most important thing to remember is to trust your medical team. The medical team selects the healthiest donors -so your sister will be cared for superbly (my husband donated to me). The transplant team’s goal is to make sure that you have an excellent recovery and outcome, so trust them and follow their directions without any deviations. Expect to rest, expect to change medications frequently as the team figures out what works best for you, and expect to ask lots of questions. Just remember that there are many variations of “normal” after transplant. Best wishes for a fantastic recovery for you and your sister.

[Okie01]

I totally agree with the rest of the comments. If you’re the type of person that wants to know exactly what’ll happen during or after the surgery as far as what you’ll possibly be hooked up to or how many IV’s you’ll have and that kind of thing, message me and I can tell you in more detail. I had my transplant Jan 13 of this year. And yes, everyone does have different experiences so maybe nothing I say will apply to you but it can’t hurt to know more. Congrats!!