Business by day, dialysis by night

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Business by day, dialysis by night

By JUDITH LACY - Tribune | Sunday, 19 October 2008

By day Isobel Shand loves making people feel good.

By night she's hooked up to a dialysis machine.

Miss Shand owns Palmerston North beauty clinic Isobel's Day Spa in Grey Street.

She's had the clinic for 11 years, starting off in a little room in George Street after graduating from the New Zealand Institute of Electrolysis & Beauty Therapy.

Chronic nephritis, inflammation of the tissues of the kidney, saw her having a kidney transplant at the age of 10.

"It's a horrible disease and it affects a huge amount of people now," she says.

About 10 years ago the transplanted kidney began to fail and Miss Shand has required dialysis since.

Four times a week, she's on the dialysis machine four and a-half hours a time, plus 30 minutes to set up and another 30 to disconnect.

The 32-year-old is usually at work 8am-6pm, with dialysis sometimes finishing as late as 2am.

"That's what you do because I have to have a normal life."

It's hard and she gets tired.

"We don't always choose what we have in life, but we have to make the most of it."

Eighteen months ago, she had another transplant but it failed from the moment it was put in her body due to a "technical error".

She was heartbroken and it was the hardest thing she's had to deal with. There was no yearned-for independence from the dialysis machine.

"So, yeah, that's a bit of a bugger."

Work keeps her focused, motivated and positive and she receives great support from her seven staff.

"I have a lovely team, they're very nice girls."

Mum Irene Dorn is also wonderful support.

Miss Shand doesn't do as much beauty therapy as she used to, but still has clients from her beauty school days.

She enjoys the interaction with clients, hearing what they've been doing, as it makes her feel "normal".

"I don't tell people I'm sick, I don't think it's necessary."

She hasn't had a holiday in 10 years so travels vicariously by listening to clients retelling their adventures.

Client isn't a word she likes much, preferring people she cares about.

It's been a gradual expansion into what the business is today. After those sole-operator days in George Street, she moved the business home for nearly a year until she found the right premises.

Then Isobel's was in Victoria Avenue for about six years and that's where she started employing staff and moving into offering day spa (four-hour) treatments.

She'd love to expand to having a spa and swimming pool at the clinic and is always trying to improve the business and upskill staff.

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