There are a couple of things that you should know about kidney disease.
For starters, there isn’t a cure. Dialysis, hemo or peritoneal, isn’t a cure. A transplant isn’t a cure.
Second, well, I’ll let Lindsey Backmeyer fill you in . . .
“Kidney disease does not give a crap that it’s Christmas time,” she wrote in a Facebook post this week.
Ferris, Lindsey and Pat’s soon-to-be four-year-old daughter, has been on dialysis, almost always peritoneal (PD), most of her young life. There have been issues of late, though, and a trip to B.C. Children’s Hospital is scheduled for early January.
In the meantime . . .
“Dialysis has been not great the past few nights and there’s this lingering feeling of ‘Oh crap! It’s Christmas . . . This is not at all how things are supposed to go.”
With Ferris having a tough go of it with PD, the spectre of an earlier than planned trip to BCCH hangs over the Backmeyers.
“We will know in the next couple of days whether we can relax or prepare to get to (BDDH) sooner than planned,” Lindsey wrote. “Things need to correct like they did in November.”
Through it all, Ferris forges on like the little trouper she is.
As Lindsey explained: “Thankfully she’s still her sassy little self. . . . Her tummy is a bit bigger, she’s not draining as well, not pulling fluid as well. She is scheduled for the hemodialysis line to be placed on Jan. 7.
“I so desperately want that time here with my family, unless of course a kidney was to come along! I want ski days and sledding and skating with my girls. However, I’m totally preparing myself for Plan B . . . or C . . .”
The Backmeyers don’t have any idea how long their Vancouver residency will last this time, and they continue to look for a rental large enough for five and with a price point that fits.
The BC Family Residency Program “will cover us to stay at the same suite we had this summer for the first month,” Lindsey explained. “After that it’s a bit outta our price range but I’m going to remain optimistic we could get transplanted . . . and be home in the spring!”
While all of this is going on, Lindsey says the family has been marvelling at the reaction from the community.
“We’ve had like this outrageous amount of support from our family and friends,” she wrote, adding that it really is helping her through a tough time.
“I tell ya . . . it’s hitting me hard this year,” she wrote. “Things feel so completely beyond my control right now and it’s not the most comforting feeling. Plus it’s friggin Christmas-time and it’s supposed to be magical and relaxing but there’s so many people calling and sooo many emails.”
Always remember, too, that Ferris has two older sisters — Ksenia and Tavia. They are a big deal, too, and can’t be forgotten in all of this.
“The last day of school was clouded with huge feelings of missing out in the new year,” Lindsey wrote. “Tavia’s teacher was away the last couple days so she was upset about not being able to present a science project, she didn’t get to give her teacher her gift, her class is tubing at Harper (Mountain) in February . . . big things in her world.”
At the end of the day, though, the Backmeyers are feeling the love, especially at this special time of year.
“I really just want to thank everyone for all of the love. I feel it so deeply I really can’t put it into words” is how Lindsey put it. “I’ve had so many moments of pure exhaustion and feelings of failure the past few weeks and someone comes in to save our day. Like, seriously, this is happening every single day around here.
“The season feels magical to my kids and they are soooo excited for Christmas. So much of it has been because of random acts of kindness for them. It’s like so ridiculously heartwarming . . . particularly this year! There still is so much good in this world!!!”
Now if only the Backmeyers would get that kidney-is-ready phone call!
How would you like it if someone offered you free footlong hotdogs for life?
Would you donate a kidney in order to take advantage of such an offer?
Well . . . here’s the deal:
Skully White operates Lullys Food Experience out of a Canadian Tire parking lot in Abbotsford, B.C. On Dec. 14, he donated a kidney to Tim Hiscock, a regular customer.
The surgery took place at Vancouver General Hospital. White was discharged two days after surgery; Hiscock went home on Friday.
One day after surgery, the two visited in Hiscock’s hospital room.
White told Scott Brown of the Vancouver Sun: “He was weak but we chatted for a little bit and eventually I just said, ‘Okay, so apart from the pain that we’re both feeling from being cut open, and the grogginess and everything. How does not being on dialysis and having the kidney feel?’ And he looked at me with a smile . . . and he had tears coming down his face. It was the most amazing feeling in the world that I could do this for him.”
White has since posted on his Facebook page, stating that “Lullys is starting a campaign to find others willing to step forward and become live kidney donors.”
The post adds: “Skully from lulls became a live kidney donor and saved somebody’s life. You can too and you’ll also get FREE footlong hotdogs for life from lullys.
“Save a life and get free hotdogs, need I say more?”
Brown’s complete story is right here.
If you are interested in being a living kidney donor, more information is available here:
Living Kidney Donor Program
St. Paul’s Hospital
6A Providence Building
1081 Burrard Street
Vancouver, BC V6Z 1Y6
Tel: 604-806-9027
Toll free: 1-877-922-9822
Fax: 604-806-9873
Email: donornurse@providencehealth.bc.ca
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Vancouver General Hospital Living Donor Program – Kidney
Gordon and Leslie Diamond Health Care Centre
Level 5, 2775 Laurel Street
Vancouver, BC V5Z 1M9
604-875-5182 or 1-855-875-5182
kidneydonornurse@vch.ca
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Or, for more information, visit right here.
TAKING NOTE 