My Story

On May 20, 2010, I checked into the hospital with very high blood pressure, an incredibly painful headache, and vomiting. After a week that felt like a House, M.D. episode where I went through a battery of tests, on May 27 (my birthday) I was diagnosed with End Stage Renal Disease. 

Upon diagnosis, the team working with me told me they were taking me to surgery to install a catheter for dialysis. When I looked at the attending physician and said “or…” he said “there is no or. We do this or you die.” 

Since it didn’t sound like I really had an option, away we went. The rest of that summer was learning an entirely new way of living: dialysis three times a week, an entirely new diet, living with limitations for the first time, and trying to convince my family and girlfriend (now wife) that I should continue and finish law school. 

I somehow won out on that last point and started the semester on hemodialysis. I scheduled my classes around treatment, the school and professors were fantastic about working with me, and I pushed through a 5 day a week class load two days a week while recovering from treatment. Part way through the fall, we switched from hemodialysis to peritoneal dialysis. This involves keeping fluid in your peritoneal cavity. And swapping it out every 8 hours. Due to my school schedule, I had some hilarious mishaps – once a police officer almost arrested me as I did a fluid exchange in my car in the law school parking lot garage! My normal schedule allowed me to return home between classes, but for some reason that day the logistics did not work out. 

Treatment logistics are everything when you have a tube that runs from the outside world into your body’s cavity where you store your organs. Infections are routine, treatment harsh, and the entire thing can be quite scary. By the end of the semester, I was on a nocturnal version of dialysis – while I was sleeping a machine took care of all the work. It warmed the fluid, pumped it into me, timed how long it stayed in me, and drained the fluid. 

Somehow I made it. McKenzie and I graduated together, moved to Massachusetts, and eventually got married. 

To make a long story slightly less long, my kidney function recovered just enough to go off dialysis in 2013. I went off all transplant lists, and doctors wondered what in the world happened. 

We knew we were living on borrowed time and that eventually this would be our lives again. In 2021, during blood testing for a medical procedure, my potassium red flagged as highly elevated. I checked in to the emergency room, they admitted me, and their ultimate diagnosis was that my kidneys were now dead and I needed to go back on dialysis. 

Because of the time lapse, I had a hemodialysis fistula already installed in my arm. I started hemodialysis right away, and when I was discharged from the hospital, I had a dialysis center and was back to three days a week. I’ve never enjoyed hemo – I hate needles – so this was a rough transition at times. Ultimately, my nurses, McKenzie and I decided that home hemo was a better choice. Home hemodialysis is gentler on the body, it takes off less fluid each session, and your energy level is generally a straighter line. In-center Hemodialysis is 3 times a week and they take a large amount of liquid out of your blood stream as they clean it. Home hemo is much less – 4 hours five times a week with less fluid removed, so your energy is more stable. 

My current day-to-day is to wake up, play with my daughter during breakfast, go to work, and immediately after work start treatment. We did not have Saoirse when we re-started hemo in 2021, and work and treatment leave me very little time to play with her each day and puts an enormous burden on McKenzie. Working 9-5 and treating for four hours after leaves little time for anything else. 

For a number of years I did not believe I deserved a transplant. I had that strange time when I no longer needed dialysis, I was not sure if I could honor the gift someone gave me by staying healthy and in shape, and honestly I could not look anyone in the eye and ask for something as significant as an organ. I’ve done deep work with a psychiatrist, a lot of self-reflection, and I’ve fallen in love with the family McKenzie and I have grown. I am now at a point where I am ready to tell my story publicly and ask if people are willing to get tested for a potential donation match or share my story to their network or community.