Jon received a kidney from his sister Jenny. He talked to us before his operation, and again some time after this recording.
A walk in the park
Jon
Jon
It’s done, after all this waiting. Just looking down at my tummy and seeing the new kidney, it makes you realise that you’ve got to look after it now. And how delicate the body is, I guess.
I went down without even knowing about it really, in the pre-theatre room. And then woke up with it all done, just like that – I think four hours later? And then was in the room downstairs, I think, being monitored for a couple of hours, and immediately felt pretty good, in myself. And eventually I came up here. I saw my sister, actually, in that room downstairs. Which was good. We were quite dosed up at the time, but I think I shouted over at her, ‘walk in the park’ or something like that.
It feels … very strange. I think I’ll have more of an idea when all the scarring’s gone and I can actually look down and see a little kidney there. But it just makes – I dunno – makes me want to look after it. It just makes me feel lucky that I’ve got a kidney, lucky that Jen gave it to me.
I’ve got three kidneys. Yeah, it’s amazing what they can do. The kidneys originally, which they took out of Jen, are tucked away in the ribcage. So they are protected, which is why, when you get a kidney transplant, they obviously can’t tuck it away in your own ribcage, so they remove it from whoever, and then place it – I think the easier side for surgeons is the right hand side, just above, above the thigh? And, obviously it’s very exposed, which means that you’ve got to be very careful about doing contact sports and just day to day life, you know – riding bikes or anything like that, because you don’t want to damage it, because it’s not protected by the ribcage.
I went down without even knowing about it really, in the pre-theatre room. And then woke up with it all done, just like that – I think four hours later? And then was in the room downstairs, I think, being monitored for a couple of hours, and immediately felt pretty good, in myself. And eventually I came up here. I saw my sister, actually, in that room downstairs. Which was good. We were quite dosed up at the time, but I think I shouted over at her, ‘walk in the park’ or something like that.
It feels … very strange. I think I’ll have more of an idea when all the scarring’s gone and I can actually look down and see a little kidney there. But it just makes – I dunno – makes me want to look after it. It just makes me feel lucky that I’ve got a kidney, lucky that Jen gave it to me.
I’ve got three kidneys. Yeah, it’s amazing what they can do. The kidneys originally, which they took out of Jen, are tucked away in the ribcage. So they are protected, which is why, when you get a kidney transplant, they obviously can’t tuck it away in your own ribcage, so they remove it from whoever, and then place it – I think the easier side for surgeons is the right hand side, just above, above the thigh? And, obviously it’s very exposed, which means that you’ve got to be very careful about doing contact sports and just day to day life, you know – riding bikes or anything like that, because you don’t want to damage it, because it’s not protected by the ribcage.