You would think that after 20 years, I would remember the exact date I gave away my left kidney. But again this year, Robert Phillips, my hubby and recipient of said kidney reminded me, that it was April 14 and not the Tax Day April 15 date that I’ve had stuck in my mind. Even then, I still looked it up in my book to confirm. Bless my heart.
it's our anniversary!
how to get on the kidney transplant wait list
Mr. Garcia was one of the lucky ones.
Not in the born-in-poverty or kidney-failure-by-30 sense. But lucky in the sense that by the time his kidneys failed completely, he was in California where Medicaid pays for undocumented folks get the same dialysis as the US-born and not in one of the 38 states that wait until undocumented people show up to their ERs damn near dead before they will give them a dialysis treatment or three before they send them back out to start the process again five or six days later—even though it is far more expensive than standard care. Because racism.
17 years and counting!
It’s our 17th kidney transplant anniversary y’all! (Check out my latest video for “Real Kidney Talk with The People’s Nephrologist” where I talk about being a kidney donor.)
If it’s not obvious from our picture, my husband and I are both Black. And don’t let the fair skin fool you: We are unapologetically and proudly Blackity-Black.