“I donated my kidney to my husband”

“I didn’t think about donating kidney to my husband; I woke up one morning and made the decision. My mind was clear: I, Faith Wambui, was going to give, my husband, Richard Thuo, my kidney. I then promptly made the announcement.

“When I broke the news to family, friends, and relatives, everyone went quiet. Some expressed their shock and tried to dissuade me. They were afraid it would be too riskyand result in the death of one or both of both the donor and recipient. We had children, and people feared for the worst. But my mind was made up. I didn’t see death, I saw hope. I saw an end to the many struggles we had faced with my husband illness over the years.

“You see, it was unlikely that the donation would come from his kin, or his children. Their family had a history of diabetes, which he too had been suffering. This trait was in the children’s genetic make up. People who are at risk of diabetes need their two kidneys just in case.

“My family, on the other hand, had no history of neither diabetes nor high blood pressure. So why not me? After all, this is a man I had been married to and loved for close to three decades.

But let me start from the beginning. In 1992, my husband developed diabetes. I was working for KCC as a food technologist and he worked at Nairobi City Council. As we managed the disease through medication and lifestyle changes, he started developing complications.

“By 2012, the complications were severe. It would manifest itself in swelling all over his body, fatigue, and loss of breath. We were advised to see a nephrologist. We saw six of them. They all diagnosed him with kidney disease brought about by diabetes. By 2014, his kidneys were operating at about 10 per cent, which greatly affected his quality of life. The doctors all advocated dialysis as a way of cleaning toxins from his body.

“We were hesitant. We had done our research. Dialysis meant that he had to undergo two to three sessions each week at a cost of between Sh9-10,000 for the rest of his life. Kenyatta National Hospital was overwhelmed with demand for the facility; patients died in queue and machines broke down often. We ruled it out.

“By now we were living on hope. We were constantly visiting doctors, doing one test after another and receiving medication. My husband’s condition was deteriorating rapidly. Our finances were depleted. We needed another option.

“During one visit our doctor had mentioned a kidney transplant. It would cost Sh3 million. We also needed a willing donor. That’s where I came in. I chose to donate despite not knowing whether we were compatible. Our blood group needed to be the same.

“We now had to embark on fundraising and doing the compatibility tests. One day, after a visit to our doctor, we noticed a wellness clinic opposite our specialist’s office. We got curious after seeing medical tourism and kidney transplant mentioned on their board. The clinic facilitated treatment in India. We were given the price breakdown and they were comparably lower than the Sh3 million given by our doctor.

“We were instantly sold. Our compatibility test was back and we were a match. I was relieved. We started the lengthy and tedious process of getting the relevant documentation to travel to India, Bangalore City. 

“End of November 2014, my husband, my sister-in-law and myself travelled to Bangalore awaiting the transplant.  While there, tests revealed that my husband had two blocked heart valves. Apparently, this is what had been causing the swellings and loss of breath. Kenyan specialists had never picked it up.

“He had to be operated on immediately as the transplant could not proceed. We gave the go ahead. After the surgery, he had to recover for two months. He developed pneumonia in the meantime, but thank God it was soon cured. He had to do 20 sessions of dialysis because of this.

“On February 10, 2015, we were back on the operating table. As the panel of experts noted the risks to me, it was a blur. I didn’t hear nor see the death risks as I signed the papers. I didn’t even think of my children, who had to step in and take run the home. My focus was on my husband's recovery. 

“Two and half hours later, my surgery was successful and in another room, my husband was receiving my kidney. On the third day, I was up and about and on the sixth day my husband was released from the hospital. We took a further two months of recovery and observation in India. In April 2015, we were back home. Five months into recovery, we were in the United States, this time grieving with my son, who had lost his young wife to a cardiac arrest.

“Today I am in perfect health and no one can tell I operate on one kidney. My husband is also stable. We thank God. I have learned the value of family, relatives, and friends, who supported us financially and emotionally. We are now also closer as a family. Personally, I realised life is too short to spend it in squabbles and non-issues.

“My mantra today is that I need to carry the burden that I can, leave what I cannot change, try my very best for what I can handle and let go of the past. It’s the past for a reason. Let it remain there.”