A Holiday Update!

It's been awhile since I've posted anything on here, but I wanted to just tell you how much I am loving feeling better. My life over the past couple months have been magical! I've been truly blessed to not get sick with any of the flus going around. I'm taking advantage of my time off by cooking, baking, making holiday cards, and learning how to sew. I'm truly cherishing my time at home with my parents knowing I'll be back in Austin, going full speed ahead in about a month.

I'm in love with glitter, adding it to everything from Christmas cards to pictures of Jordan Shipley.

I threw a small Thanksgiving dinner party about 2 weeks ago for 9 of my friends. I made a turkey, all by myself. I wish I had taken a picture! I also made stuffing and chocolate and bourbon pecan pie with homemade vanilla beam whipped cream. My friends overwhelmed me with their willingness to contribute. Everyone brought side dishes from mac and cheese to creamed corn to green bean casserole... everyone wanted to help! And everything was delicious. It was so magical!

I have watched my Texas Longhorns go 13-0. I won't be at the Big 12 game this weekend. Buuut I'll be watching, waiting for it to be official that we're going to the NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP. I already have my game ticket, flight, and hotel!

I cannot wait for Christmas to get closer! I'm so thankful for all the blessings of the past few months and I can't wait to take advantage of the season and use my time to spend time with family and make festive crafts, food, and sweet treats!

I want to thank everyone for the love and support I have received! Even throughout one of the most difficult times in my life, I have always felt truly cared for and totally supported, making this road so much easier to travel. I truly believe I could face any trial that comes my way and come out stronger as long as I have the love of my beautiful friends and loving family! God bless you all this Christmas season!

-Mary Katherine

Less Than 2 Weeks Now

Short Update.

Okay, I apologize for what I'm sure are many typos and grammatical errors from my last entry. I honestly don't even remember writing it (Thanks, Dilaudid!).

I am feeling relatively good. I gained about 20lbs (just imagine) of excess fluid from being in the hospital. It's been rough having none of my clothes fit me, and getting all that excess weight off. I've lost 11 lbs so far.

I'm off all pain meds. I have a fever at night. It's still hard to get up off the couch. Good, bad, and lazy.

At the end of the day, it's still Friday night. All my friends have something better going on tonight than sitting on the couch watching Chelsea Handler. Maybe next week for me.

After 3 Days of Misery, Now Relief

So the last time I wrote, everything seemed to be cupcakes and rainbows with the transplant. I had hardly any pain and I was up and moving only hours after waking up. Then reality set in. After two great days of putting on make up and being all smiles, things changed. The pain ball that was attached to my incision was removed. So it was just me and the pain. I've been through a lot in the past 9 years. From a lung transplant, to shingles, to getting my gums burned off, to pneumonia, to breaking my arm and recently my leg; you name it, it's seems like I've been through it all. But this was the worst pain I'd ever experienced in my life.

My incision hurt like nothing I'd ever felt before. Any movement of my torso caused extreme pain. It was like someone was twisting a knife into my incision. Getting out of bed to walk to the bathroom was enough to take my breath away to where all I could do was scream. Walking was impossible. The thought of getting out of bed was enough to bring me to tears. I was convinced I had something terribly wrong with me.

After 2 days of this, with the pain only getting worse. We decided something needed to be done. About midnight Saturday night, we got an ultrasound. My new kidney was totally healthy. There was no fluid surrounding it. It was perfect. This brought both relief and confusion. What is wrong?!

On Sunday, we all were at the end of our rope. We begged the doctors for answers. Finally, we have some. During the surgery, muscles and nerves are cut. Swelling is a natural part of surgery, but unfortunately, when you're small, the swelling can be much more uncomfortable. All these cut nerves and tissue are stuck in my tiny tummy and this can cause nerves to press up and crimp against things, which can lead to the extreme pain. So there's a con for being skinny. If you need a kidney, I suggest you get a bit of tummy going. You're gonna need some extra space.

Luckily after lots of trial and error, we finally found a drug that gave me some relief. After morphine, tylenol with codeine, and fentanyl all failed miserably, I met dilaudid. One shot of that in my IV and I was walking, washing my hair, putting on make up. It's a real love story with dilaudid. It seriously saved my sanity. I am hoping to go home tomorrow with the pill form of my new boyfriend. In all seriousness though, I'm hoping to be off the drugs as soon as possible. My doctors say that the swelling will get better every day.

I think I've finally turned the corner, with help from the pain meds. I should be going home tomorrow. I can't wait to hug my little Claire and sleep without being interrupted. I'm finally feeling good. Overall though, this was a great experience. Great doctors, expert surgeons, and a loving family around me to deal with all my moodiness. I cannot wait to rejoin society healthy and happy. I'm so grateful for everyone's prayers, support, flowers, and sweet treats! There's so much love in my life, it's crazy and I'm truly in awe of it.

End Stage Renal Failure: The Season Finale

I'm sitting here in ICU. And it's done. And so the hard work begins. The surgery is the easy part for me, especially with how sick I've been. I mean, I got propofol. How exciting is that?! If it's good enough for Michael Jackson, I'll take it! I didn't have any psychedelic Colt McCoy National Title themed fantasies, which was disappointing. But I do have a morphine button that can dispense some pain relieving greatness every five minutes so things kind of evened out.

I'm no longer nauseated. My stomach doesn't feel like it's turning inside out. I'm not exhausted and I'm not freezing cold. My hemoglobin has gone from 7 to 9.5 already. My incision hurts but you can't make a salmon frittata without breaking a few eggs, am i right?

The love and support I have seen has been truly overwhelming, in a good way! I want to be sure to take the time to thank of each of you individually for sending me such positivity and showing such respect for me in this really hard time.

I have an uphill trek ahead but I'm so excited about what the view from the top will be. Please continue to pray for me, for my Aunt Cheryl and for all the doctors and nurses. Thank you, from the bottom of my heart! Love, Mary and her new kidney

Let's Do the Damn Thing

In terms of tomorrow, I'm not scared. I'm just really ready to get this over with. I want to get in, get out, and involve as few people as possible. This is nothing against all the wonderful people who love me and have been concerned for me. This has a lot more the do with the fact that the hospital turns me into a mood fourteen year old. All the sudden terms like "no one understands me!" and "why does everything happen to me!?" seem to spew out along with plenty of tears. So you can imagine why in the middle of a meltdown I wouldn't want some well meaning visitor to walk in... AWKWARD! Not to mention I'll have a central line coming out of neck, a little tidbit I learned today.

I'm not totally anti-visitor. But if you get turned away, I apologize in advance. I don't mean to be such a mess!

My biggest fear is disappointment. I'm pinning all my hopes and dreams for the future on this transplant. I worry I'm going to feel better, but not a lot better. But worrying doesn't help anything. So, I'm trying not to do it and just trying to get excited about getting drugs tomorrow.

I'm sure I'll be back texting everyone and back on Facebook in no time. I'll talk to ya'll real soon.

With Just a Few Days Left

Preparing for surgery is very similar to preparing for a trip. Though my destination is neither fun nor exotic, I still needed to get my life together. Some people have to get their financial things in order, bills paid, and such. Other people maybe like to have some sort of special gathering or have heart to hearts with all their close friends. Well, I've never been one for serious stuff. However, there were still some important things weighing on my minds.

For one thing, my Halloween costume. I know, it's September. But in Austin, there's only one place to get your costume. The creme de la creme of costume shops: Lucy's in Disguise with Diamonds on South Congress. My first year, I was fortunate enough to see Andy Roddick and stand right next to him while at the cash register. Though I have yet to reunite with Andy, I still go to Lucy's every year. The problem is that if you wait til mid-October, half of Austin is there and it's impossible to move around freely let alone find something in your size. I'm gonna be out of commission for the next few weeks. And once I can get back to running errands, I doubt Lucy's is going to be my first stop. So, it was important to go before my surgery. For the record, I settled on sexy schoolgirl this year.

Then there's the priority of football. I will be missing the UTEP game. I wish I could say I was at every game this year when we all look back at our National Title trek to Pasadena. But at least I have a pretty good excuse. I didn't want to be depressed about missing the game or even more importantly, tailgating. So, I decided to get my fill this week and tailgate for about 12 hours. Arriving at the tailgate spot before sunrise for a 7 pm game was not the wisest decision I'd ever made. It's hard to keep that stamina when you're healthy, let alone ill. By the time we had destroyed Texas Tech and gotten back home free of raider rash, it was midnight. I felt like passing out and throwing up all at the same time. Luckily I was able to drag myself upstairs and into bed. A good 12 hours of sleep later, I felt a little better. I don't think I'll ever recover fully though. And the good news is that not being able to tailgate this week is A-Okay with me now. In fact, if someone told me I had to redo yesterday all over again tomorrow, I'd probably cry. However, I will be sad to miss the game, especially Colt and Jordan (did you know they're roommates?). I just need to make sure the hospital gets Fox Sports. Oh and if you are reading and were planning to visit on Saturday, you can reconsider that now. That goes for doctors, nurses, and random techs who wander in wanting to weigh me for the 3rd time.

Besides that, I don't know what else there is to do, besides of course, setting my DVR to record all my favorite shows. Like I said, I'm trying to compare it to going on a 5 day vacay. The trip just went really bad and I somehow ended up in the hospital. I don't even remember how. See, that's not so scary.

Things I have been doing that have kept me from Blogging

• baking
• decorating
• breaking things
• surviving ikea trips
• eating at kerbey lane
• becoming addicted to hbo
• reading books
• drinking coffee bean
• being everyone's new favorite sober driver
• feeling way too old at frat parties
• going to alamo drafthouse
• tailgating
• searching for pretty eyeshades
• mix 94.7 90's weekend
• 5 free wing coupons
• disputes with our apartment company
• watching OU continue to suck
• making my bed every day
• writing threatening notes to the people parking in my reserved spot
• twittering
• joining the pragertopia podcast so i never miss the male/female hour
• watching Texas come out with a glorious win: 59-20! 1 down, 11 to go!

So, in this case, no news is good news. I keep myself rested. I feel no anxiety about the coming weeks ahead. I feel little symptoms of my disease at the moments I do feel bad come and go quickly. I have overwhelming feelings of nausea that tend to come on quickly and without warning. But laying down for half an hour and closing my eyes usually leaves me feeling good as new. No medication needed. The biggest problem is feeling short of breath with the slightest exertion due to my worsening anemia. This wouldn't be a big problem except I don't want to slow down. If I was okay with never getting up or going anywhere, I probably wouldn't even notice it. But since I don't want to miss any of what is now Junior year 2.0, it's just a side effect I'll have to deal with. And sometimes it's okay to slow down. But for the most part, it's not something I intend to do! Consider no news good news! Love love love.

The Healing Powers of Austin, TX

I'm not sure what it is about going from San Antonio to Austin. But something about that drive, looking at DKR, and Miley Cyrus's Party in the USA on full blast and I was a new person. I mean, the treks back and forth to the car carrying boxes were tiring. And I found myself having to sit and catch my breath. But there was no mommy or daddy there. If I wanted to get that stuff out of the car and up to my bedroom, all I had was me, myself, and I. There was a possibility I'd get really sick and curl up in a ball on the bathroom floor and need my mom to come rescue me. By the grace of God, that never happened. I walked around west campus like anyone else. Sure I was secretly out of breath and my body temperature felt way too high. But no one knew that. I just got to be Mary, the new version of course. The version that sits for hours at Abels and doesn't order a Texas Tea, or an H-Bomb but instead a simple Coca-Cola. And the new version who calls it a night at 12:30 instead of 3:15. It was a simple night sitting around a table in bar but for those few hours, I wasn't sick. I was Mary, everyone's friend who made jokes and smiled and was exactly the same as before she left. Except there was no rum in this Coke.

My "big" accomplishment of the trip was getting my duvet inside my duvet cover. I couldn't wrap my little brain around how to do this without giving myself a heart attack. Eventually I regressed to the age of about 6 and crawled completely into the duvet cover, with the comforter in hand and, pretending my West Elm duvet was some sort of tent, went around nook and cranny of it til the cover was stuffed perfectly and my hair was a giant static ball. If I had a reality TV show, and it hadn't been cancelled and I hadn't been asked to leave the country because of my shenanigans, then tunneling in the duvet would have been my "chicken of the sea" moment. But the fact that I did this without passing out or wanting to vom was really exciting and got me thinking about all the other little things I could do around my new place. For the first time since I left Austin, I felt like getting up and moving. There were things I wanted to accomplish and none of those things involved sitting on the couch. Okay, maybe a nap midday.

I know tomorrow I might feel like complete crap again like I did over the weekend. But I also might feel okay. Who knows. I like to be optimistic though. I know most of this is probably divine intervention and there is no logical explanation for why I am able to half the things I do with a creatinine this high (mine is 5.5. Yours is probably 1 or less.). But I don't need an explanation. I'm just gonna enjoy it. If I completely break down tomorrow, I'm sure I'll be heartbroken. So I'll do my part in staying hydrated, eating what I can, and leave the rest up to God.

Prayers are still awesome. Things are moving along with donor selection but nothing is final yet and I don't want to give information out until it's totally decided upon. Pray for wisdom for the doctors, myself, and my family. Big decisions are coming every day. But at least things are moving.

A New Day.

I woke up today with a new feeling in my heart. Peace. I don't know what's going to happen. But whatever it is I'm okay with it. Nothing has changed with the progression of my surgery. Every day is a day closer to dialysis. I have been suffering for weeks upon weeks to avoid dialysis and having a central line put in. But after a weekend that was spent on the sofa curled up in the ball, questioning whether I should go to the ER or just take another Phenergan and pass the time sleeping, I finally reached a state where the disease seemed worse than any treatment could be. Yes, hook me up to a machine. Please, clean out whatever is making me so sick.

Before, dialysis seemed like something that would keep me prisoner and now it feels like the disease is the thing holding my hostage from the world. So go ahead, give me a central line. I wasn't exactly asking the frat guys to take a number as it was. I'll just stick to my M.O. of being really tough and hardcore.

I had gotten into this mode of feeling so sorry for myself laying on that couch. This morning, I starting getting ready for my day when Sunday Bloody Sunday came on my iPod. My mind went to the U2 concert I have tickets to in October and I was like "You're going to this. You're going to hear Bono. Unless you are plugged into the wall, you are going to get there. It's not that far off. You can do it a little longer. Put on some decent clothes, brush your hair, and quit acting so worthless."

I can barely eat anything that isn't bland and disgusting or some form of Jello. So what. I'll get super skinny and I'll secretly kind of like it but be really concerned on the the outside. In all seriousness, I do miss my meat and cheese. I still haven't tried the new cheddar burger at Whataburger and it's breaking my heart. It looks amazing but I'm pretty sure I would just projectile right there in the booth after one bite of so much beefy cheesy goodness.

I'm thinking of heading to Austin tonight to soak in my apartment and friends because by tomorrow all my optimism may have drained out of me and my stomach may be back to rejecting everything I send it's way. The point is that isn't the case today. Today is a good day. That's all that matters.

Slow Moving

We still don't have a donor. And It's looking more and more like I might end up on dialysis. Sicker and sicker every day. I'll update more soon. There's a lot of things up in the air still. Please pray.

On the Bad Days...

...And in the bad weeks... It's important to remember good days. This guy had probably had some bad days too. But it was close to his sickest that he made his biggest shot. I don't really compare to Sean Elliott, unfortunately. All I've done today is watch Aliens of the Ancient World on History Channel (as in aliens, not immigrants. the "experts" they interview on this subject provide enough comedic relief on their own to make it worth watching). So I'm not sure what my point is here. I just like the feeling I get watching old Spurs videos. And I like to think I still might be a little bit useful. I’m going to make some muffins. I can be the Sean Elliott of the kitchen for now.
And I hope next week is better both physically and emotionally. PS: Enjoy the sexyness of vintage Spurs. A little David Robinson is always a good thing.

A Lightbulb (Moment) in the Darkness

Today I finally had to sign a paper withdrawing myself from UT for medical reasons. It was painful to do so. Part of me kept hoping I'd go to the doctor one day and they be it "it's the strangest thing, your kidneys seem to have completely healed! We don't need to do a transplant!" And since I'm being completely unrealistic, I'm gonna throw in that my boobs got magically big and my hair was really thick but not too thick. It was all part of some crazy new medical condition that I have that's actually positive. Oh, and this condition is so crazy and so interesting, I get to go on Oprah and chat it up with her. I'm not a big Oprah fan. There's a lot "rediscovering yourself" and other buzz phrases that just make me uncomfortable. I really just like to see the cool stories she showcases. Like the girl who woke up one morning and her kidney disease was cured. Oh yeah, I forgot, I made that all up.

Anyways, back to what we're actually having to face. With a transplant in the coming weeks (God willing), I will miss the beginning of classes and possibly a nail-biting season opener against Louisiana-Monroe. Follow up appointments will start out probably every week or so and then move to be more spread out as time passes, but I'll still have to be in San Antonio during the week more than I usually would be. Balancing commuting with classes would probably be very stressful. I'm glad I don't even have to think about it.

Oh, also, Swine Flu. That's a reason right there to drop out of school. That's also a reason to demand free shots at Blind Pig even when it's not your birthday. Totally unrelated story. Ask and I will tell you at a later time.

So, I'll be taking a little break this semester. I'll still be attending every football game unless I'm in the hospital and if those aren't on TV, I'll probably bust out AMA. I know where to put my priorities. If anyone has any fun ideas about part time jobs or volunteer work, I'd love to hear your suggestions. I've been wanting to possibly find work or a volunteer position in a doctors office or hospital. So I still might get swine flu. Don't ever count me out when it comes to weird diseases. Not to be negative about all my health problems. Because I really am not. And I know I was sounding anti-Oprah earlier, but she is a smart lady overall. I caught an episode of hers over a month ago and she was sharing her health problems with the world. I learned Oprah was dealing with high blood pressure (high five girlfriend), heart palpitations, and being on heart medication. The word transplant had just been put in the discussion between my doctor and I. I was feeling so angry, I really did hate being me. Why did things on me keep breaking? I'm 21, I'm young, I'm shouldn't need this. I was feeling so sorry for myself. That's when Oprah said this:

"One of the things I had to do was learn to embrace this body that I have and be grateful for what this body has given me... God blessed me with this body. I mean, I could weep right now thinking about the love and appreciation I have for this body. For that, I am truly grateful."

My eyes welt up with tears and in that moment my perspective did a complete 180. I realized my body was not my enemy but a gift that despite being so sick and so weak was still waking up and working for me every day. I felt so overwhelmed with emotion. Then, all the sudden, I felt silly. There I was, 4 pm on a weekday afternoon, crying in my living room in front of Oprah on the tv. That's when I rolled my eyes and thought "Dammit Oprah! You finally got me crying! Are you happy now?!" I had finally had one of those "lightbulb moments" that Oprah always talks about. I'm happy to say she didn't TOTALLY brainwash me at that moment and I've been able to resist buying Surius/XM Radio despite the promise of Gayle King being on Oprah Radio every day. But I DO kept that quote in mind, and I try to be grateful, even when I have to give up the things I love like my tequila, my summer break, and now my most amazing UT. Hook 'Em Horns!

Good News

Thought I'd just share that I'm feeling pretty good today. As in, it's 2pm and I haven't felt nauseated or overwhelming dizzy. I haven't had a tension headache and I haven't needed a nap. Also, since I got sick, I haven't been able to eat any meat. Something about it, I just couldn't bring myself to get back on a normal diet. I'd eat a little bit of seafood, and mainly a lot bread. Well today, I ate half a hamburger. Yay for small victories. It won't be long before I'm making late night runs to Jack in the Box and ordering some ridiculous combo meal that I secretly scarf in my bedroom then throw away in the outside dumpster so nobody will ever know. Wait, what?

Anyways, I know a lot of people have been praying so I thought I'd throw something positive out into the world. If you have time to keep praying, that would be awesome, and if you have ALOT of time, you could even pray that I get a new car. But that's only if you're really bored. In which case call me. I'm really bored too. We could talk about the History Channel special I watched on Hitler's ties to the occult that I was able to catch the other day. Maybe some other time? Sounds good.

I Am Having Trouble Understanding

Yesterday, I was watching Man vs. Food on the Travel Channel. Adam Richman finally made his way to San Antonio and I'm really not sure what took him so long. While I only caught the last 15 minutes of the program, I saw more than enough. More being the key word. Adam is a sizable guy, and these locals who were cheering him on as he ate some stupidly spicy hamburger were probably doubly as big as Adam. There's probably a 99% chance one of them will be sitting next to me in clinic at the Transplant Institute next week too. Thankfully, kidney transplants have become a safe surgery with minimal risk and minimal recovery time. But I worry that because it's become a fairly common operation, people are going to take their health for granted even more than we Americans already do. There's a solution for every problem that we bring upon ourselves. We all too often are just looking for a magic pill or in this case even operation. Let me just tell you that while the surgery is easy, the weeks leading up to it are nothing but.

Last night, I was laying in bed playing out a routine that has sadly become all too familiar. I was curled up in a ball, trying my very hardest to concentrate on anything besides the overwhelming feeling of nausea that seems to sneak up on me sometime between my last dose of medication and the second episode of Sex and the City on TBS. Renal failure is no walk in the park. In fact, it's quite unpleasant.

There's times I feel like I'm losing my mind. I'll start a sentence and not remember where I'm going with it. My brain is not sharp. I can't concentrate on things. I'm dizzy standing up, sitting down, all the time. Even words off the television makes me dizzy. And books have become nearly impossible, which makes me sad. I bought a new David Sedaris book which unfortunately doesn't get any funnier when you have to read the same page three times to understand it.

With all this free time, I would have imagined myself cooking up a storm. But I can't seem to muster the appetite or the energy. Simply being, living and breathing is all I can seem to handle these days and even that requires a two hour nap at some point to recharge. I'm never hungry. I remember in the early stages of my kidney disease, when I would WebMD "renal failure" and see loss of appetite for a symptom, I'd wonder why I'd have some of the other symptoms like high blood pressure and never that awesome side effect. I mean if I'm gonna be sickly, do I have to be chubby too?!

Well now I miss food. I miss drooling over meals. I miss craving things. I miss planning where I wanted to eat. I miss snacking. I miss being hungry. I miss cooking and the satisfaction it used to bring me to make something and have it taste good. These days, I'd just assume eat air.

I've come to realize I'm a special case of medication induced renal failure and that type 2 diabetes is the number one cause of renal failure. Let me say I'd never wish what I'm going through on anyone, even my worst enemy, if I had an enemy. It's physically and emotionally exhausting. And because you have energy for nothing else, it's all consuming. Last night, I couldn't help but wonder how anyone could allow this disease to take over, knowing in so many cases it is totally preventable. I don't say this to judge anybody. We all have our bad habits. I had to break up with my boyfriend Jose Cuervo a few months ago cause I realized it was doing nothing but bad things for my health, so I know how it goes. But if you or someone you know is at risk for renal disease, and you live in this city that is ignorant to the downside of a 3 1/2 lb cinnamon bun, let me tell you that what you stand to go through in renal failure is not worth it. Man vs. Food. Man does not always win, at least in the long run.

Bob Stoops hates Puppies, Jesus, and Healthy Nephrons

Some of you might be wondering what it was that pushed my kidneys from not quite perfect to completely rotten. I’ve got two words for you: Bob Stoops.
Yeah. That’s right.
Okay well, not exactly. At some point mid-July, I probably ate at a restaurant and had a lovely meal. The problem with that lovely meal was that whoever prepared it wasn’t feeling too hot. This same person also apparently wasn’t familiar with this weird little ritual called hand washing. So along with my lunch (I’m picturing this evil little thing appearing in an innocent looking salad) came a parasite, which I have affectionately come to call Bob Stoops.
After about a week of incubating in my tummy, Bob Stoops decided to rear his ugly head. And then, it was the beginning of the end. The timing was really confusing because I had just gotten out of the hospital after checking into the ER for a migraine. So I thought I had picked up a little bug by touching some surface there. Also, my blood pressure medication had just been raised. It’s made me sick to my stomach in the past. Was it possible that this new high dosage was tearing up my insides again?
All these variables, plus the fact that I was out of the state for 5 days meant that this whole thing went unchecked for well over a week. When I got back to Texas, I went to the doctor and got a string of tests done just to safe. All the usual bacterium and viruses came back negative but one thing did stand out: This had taken my kidneys from bad to worse. I needed to get to the hospital ASAP.
A few days later, and I get the news every Cosmo girl wants to hear: you have a parasite. Oh, that’s nice. The one silver lining came when they pulled out the scale on me and I had lost 5 pounds. I tried to hold my excitement. It was the first time I had felt good in days.
I’ve been out of the hospital since Sunday and I’m finally getting over it. Unfortunately, the damage of Bob Stoops still remains and I am left with 13% kidney function. So we gotta get this show on the road. Now that my thighs don’t touch together when I walk, I feel pretty much unstoppable.

21-Year-Old College Senior. Loves Mexican Food. Needs Kidney.

I’m a very private person. That’s why I am writing this blog.
Come again?
Okay let me elaborate here. I’ll talk your ear off about my feelings on Bobby Flay, Oklahoma, and my constant desire to lose about 7 pounds. One thing I don’t like to go on and on about is my health problems. I kind of like to be in denial that they even exist. But I got slapped with reality recently. So here it is: I’ve been sick since I was 12 years old. For those of you who aren’t up to speed, I got mysteriously ill when I was 11 and in less than a year, I needed new lungs. As you probably know, transplant recipients have to take immunosuppressant medications their whole life to avoid rejection. You take them and you’re all good. Right?
Well…
It’s sort of a double-edged sword. You keep those lungs nice and healthy and take the drugs like you’re supposed to. But by doing what you’re supposed to do, you’re actually killing other parts of your body. These drugs wreck your kidneys. Most people get about 5 years out of them. I got almost 9. It’s hard for me to say “lucky me” even though I guess 4 extra years is pretty good. It’s about to be my senior year though. It’s about to be FOOTBALL SEASON for Christ’s sake and I need a kidney. I know it’s not exactly a tragedy. But when you’re 21 and usually your biggest dilemma is what to wear and where to eat on Friday night, and all the sudden you’re being handed pamphlets about your new organ and you can’t even make plans a week in advance, it’s all very hard. Not “Flight of the Conchords is being cancelled” hard. More like “Oklahoma is going to the National Title game” hard. Now you’re starting to get it.
In recent weeks, I’ve been dealing with being physically ill, emotionally exhausted, and the fact that I have no control over my life. I’ve made this blog so I can keep everyone updated with this process without spending countless hours on the phone and replying to emails in my free time. It’s not that I don’t appreciate the love and concern each of you have for me. I just can’t talk transplant non-stop. It’s depressing. So now we’re all on the same page. And you can all spare me the “I’m so sorry” speeches. I mean, come on, it’s Shark Week on the Discovery Channel. Let’s not ruin that.
This isn’t saying you can’t ever call or email or text me. I love my friends and family and I know ya'll have genuine concern for me. Also, this may be the first some of ya'll are hearing about any of this so feel free to ask any questions and I'll do my best to answer all of them. I know more about transplants than some MDs. But if there’s days I can’t or don’t want to talk to people, that’s where this comes in. These past few weeks have been rough, but I am getting to accept this and move forward. I really just want to get back to feeling like Mary Katherine. Easy going, self-deprecating, fun loving, Mary Katherine.