Jun, 11, 2007
Friends celebrate 10th anniversary of kidney giftDEAN KAHN
About two-dozen people gathered recently for the 10th anniversary of a life-giving moment.
On May 29, 1997, Bonnie Drewes’ left kidney was removed and implanted into Cindy Henninger’s abdominal area, where it immediately kicked into action cleansing her blood.
Good thing, too. Without a successful transplant, Cindy would likely be dead by now.
She wouldn’t be around to watch her daughter, Laura, grow up and prepare to graduate from Bellingham High School. She wouldn’t be around to survive a decade with her gift kidney, not an easy thing to do. She wouldn’t be around to become an even better friend of Bonnie’s.
“I’ve received this humongous thing,” Cindy said. “Life.”
The people who celebrated May 29 were friends and family members who had gathered and prayed at a Seattle hospital the day of the surgery, and friends who cared for Bonnie and Cindy’s children while their moms went under the knife.
To celebrate, they ate Thai food at a restaurant and strawberry shortcake at Cindy’s house as they reminisced. Cindy gave Bonnie roses.
The two Bellingham women have been friends since 1980, when they met at their church, Christ the Servant Lutheran. Both were, and remain, active in the church’s music program. As they got to know each other, they discovered they lived in the same neighborhood at the time, and had children the same age: Laura, and Bonnie’s son, Max.
Eight years after Cindy and Bonnie met, Cindy learned she had lupus, a chronic inflammatory disease that began attacking her kidneys. In time, she needed kidney dialysis; at first, twice a day, then later, every 4½ hours. She grew so weak she had to give up her teaching job.
Cindy didn’t have blood relatives able to donate a kidney, so she carried a beeper, hoping it would alert her that a donor had died with a usable kidney. By 1996, Cindy was told that without a new kidney, she could be dead within two years.
That’s when members of Christ the Servant stepped forward to help. Bonnie and two other women were tested to see if they would be a suitable match to donate a kidney. Others were willing to be tested. Turns out Bonnie was a good match, as well as a good friend.
They were scheduled for surgery the summer of 1996, but Cindy suffered a stroke and needed time to recuperate. Then, a few days before their 1997 surgery date, Cindy’s beeper activated. A donor had died, but he reportedly had a history of drug and alcohol use. Should Cindy accept his kidney and spare Bonnie?
“I would have been disappointed,” said Bonnie, now 54. “I was in gear.”
After talking with her husband, Bruce, and her doctor, Cindy decided to stick with Bonnie, hoping the man’s kidney could save someone else.
Cindy, 49, said Bonnie’s willingness to donate a kidney reflects her friend’s giving attitude as well as her practical nature.
“It was, ‘You need something, I can provide that,’” Cindy said.
For her part, Bonnie has never felt squeamish about medical matters. Besides, she knew a person can live with one kidney.
After the surgery, Bonnie had what she calls “major discomfort” for a few days, then minor discomfort for a few weeks, and then she felt fine. Cindy felt better right away as her new kidney began removing toxins from her blood.
Cindy did have a short-term problem with her anti-organrejection drugs a few years ago, and the medication she still takes thins her hair and produces warts.
“What a small trade-off,” she said.
Her lupus is less severe now. She has resumed teaching music part-time. She enjoys her good health, and considers each day a gift.
Still, she chokes up in church every time they sing the refrain from Michael Joncas’ song “No Greater Love” —“There is no greater love, says the Lord, than to lay down your life for a friend. There’s no greater love, no greater love, than to lay down your life for a friend.” *
*Used by Permission of GIA Publications Inc.
Dean Kahn’s column runs on Sundays and Mondays. If you have a suggestion for a column, contact him at dean.kahn@bellinghamherald.com or 715-2291.
http://www.bellinghamherald.com/102/story/101564.html
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