Two families bond while caring for special-needs children

Father donates kidney to another couple's child
Two families bond while caring for special-needs children
11:07 AM, Jun 21, 2012 | Comments

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Fathers Josh Graham (left) and Donnie Meador meet for the first in May. On June 25, Graham will donate one of his kidneys to Meador's 3-year-old daughter Maggie to give her a second chance of life. Maggie and her mother Laura stand behind the fathers. Submitted photo
Written by
Dessislava Yankova
Gallatin News Examiner

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Gallatin
Gallatin Neighbors
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Maggie Meador, 3, will undergo a kidney transplant on June 25. / Submitted photo
To learn more, visit:

Maggie Meador’s support page facebook.com/pages/Maggies-Prayer-Warriors/242412885814111
Josh Graham and Maggie Meador meet for the fist time:
sweetbabyc.blogspot.com/2012/05/
Josh Graham undergoes medical exams for the kidney transplant:
sweetbabyc.blogspot.com/2012/04/donor-work-up-101-appointmentpalooza.html

A 3-year-old Sumner County girl will live to spend many more days with her dad thanks to another dad - making this Father’s Day memorable for two families.

On Monday, June 25, Josh Graham and Maggie Meador will each undergo a transplant surgery in which the father of two will donate his kidney to the young girl.

For the past year and a half, Maggie and her Cottontown family have fought hard for the life of the toddler, who suffers from a rare form of kidney disease, focal segmental glomerular sclerosis, which is associated with kidney failure and can be life-threatening.

Her family, however, didn’t know Maggie was suffering from the illness until February of 2011, when she was two and a half years old. Maggie kept experiencing reoccurring pneumonia, leading to numerous pediatrician visits. Doctors from Sumner and Davidson counties worked together to discover why Maggie’s condition worsened.

“They thought it might be an immune deficiency, but they didn’t expect it’s her kidney,” Maggie’s mother Laura Meador said.

Discovering Maggie's condition
One day in February of 2011, while at the pediatrician’s office in White House, Maggie’s condition required she be transported to the emergency room at the Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt in Nashville. The little girl could not breathe, and doctors had to stimulate her oxygen intake through a breathing-assistance machine called a ventilator, which led to the discovery of her kidney illness.

“My and your kidneys works as colanders, and Maggie’s kidneys work as a tennis racquet,” Meador said. “Her kidneys’ filters are damaged and leak the proteins that are supposed to stay in her bloodstream.”

As a result, Maggie had high blood pressure, required a restricted low-sodium and controlled-fluid-intake diet, and received multiple medications daily, including a high dose of steroids. For eight months, she received daily dialysis while she was also hooked to an intravenous line.

Due to the low levels of one particular protein, albumin, Maggie further required hundreds of blood donations to supply the vital protein one to three times a day.

“You really don’t pay attention to the need for blood until it’s your own child or a loved one,” Meador said, praising the American Red Cross for assisting with the blood drives.

Special-needs parents' network
Despite all efforts, in October of 2011, Maggie had a complete kidney failure. Doctors began searching for kidney donors, starting with her parents. Her mother had a different blood type and was ruled out as a donor. Her father’s blood type matched, but physicians discovered stones in his kidneys.

“Finding out that I was unable to help my own daughter was devastating,” Donnie Meador said.

Distraught, the Meador family posted a plea on the toddler’s support Facebook page, “Maggie’s Prayer Warriors,” seeking donors. Meanwhile, during the multiple hospital visits, Laura Meador had reconnected with a former Portland High School classmate, Tonya Graham, who also had to go to Vanderbilt often for her recently adopted son, Chase, 2, who has difficulties breathing because of small airways.

Attending to their special-needs children, the two mothers rekindled their friendship creating a support group for one another.

“Whenever you have a child with special needs, you really start to network with many other parents who share similar stresses,” Tonya Graham’s husband, Josh, said. “It’s a stressful life to live not knowing if you’ll be packing to stay four days at the hospital or not knowing if we can get Chase stable enough to even make it to the hospital.”

While following Maggie’s progress online, the Grahams, who live in Portland, noticed when Meadors’ story of joy turned into one of sorrow when the father couldn’t donate. As soon as Josh Graham saw the Facebook plea, he volunteered to become a donor without ever having met the Meadors.

Not only did Graham have Maggie’s blood type, but he also shared one of her seven antigens, a necessity for a transplant to succeed. “If you’re not a relative, it’s really, really rare for any of the antigens to match,” Graham said.

Graham was the only winning match out of 32 applicant donors. After going through all the testing, he says he is ready for the four-hour surgery to be followed by four days in the hospital and six weeks of home recovery.

“I don’t feel I’m doing a whole lot,” Graham said. “I just lie on the medical table, at the hospital and then at home with my lovely wife taking care of me being the biggest baby. The two people to have the most work after the operations are Laura and Tonya, because they’re going to handle entire families and households with someone recovering.

“As a father of a special-needs child, every time the gut instinct is to help and heal your kid. I’m not able to do that for Chase, but I’m grateful that I’m able to do that for Maggie.”

Donnie Meador said he’s grateful and admires Graham’s selflessness.

“Josh is doing everything he can to give Maggie a second chance at life,” Meador said. “We will always have a bond, both being fathers of children with special needs, and now this bond will be even stronger.”

The Grahams, who are moving from Portland to Gallatin this weekend, have at least 20 people helping them as Josh Graham is not allowed to do physical labor in order to protect his kidneys. The two families hope Graham and Maggie would get rooms next to each other at the hospital and recover together.

Reporter Dessislava Yankova can be reached at 575-7170.

http://www.tennessean.com/article/20120618/GALLATIN06/306180069/Father-donates-kidney-to-another-couple-s-child?nclick_check=1