A Kidney Story: My Awesome Experience as A Kidney Donor: Home Sweet Home & Healing

I decided to make the trip home to Toronto the Saturday following my post-op appointment. Mom drove and I sat in the passenger seat and did a lot of backseat driving. I’m not good at not being in control of the driver’s seat. If I’m in a car I want to be the one driving. Needless to say, between that and not feeling 100% awesome it was a bit of a stressful trip. We made good time though, and when we got there Lynda had cleaned the house and made up my bed in anticipation of my arrival. It was fantastic to come home and not have to do anything!

Over the next few weeks things progressed slowly but surely. At first I was only comfortable walking around the house. Showering was still a little scary, but it got progressively better. I became more and more comfortable with getting my incisions wet.

It took me about 3 or 4 weeks to be able to stand up completely straight, and walk around without getting a backache. It was sometimes difficult to stand up straight when I was walking so I would spend about 5 minutes laying flat on the floor first. It helped to stretch out the incision area and pulled my shoulders back so it was like I was standing up straight. Instead of gravity working against me, it worked for me to help get my shoulders in the right position. I started walking in the morning at the mall. It’s indoors and someone would at least be able to see me if I fell down or if something happened and I needed help. Plus it made it easy to push myself a little bit further every day. I could do one more lap if I was feeling up to it.

At 5 weeks the swelling started to go down, and my energy started to pick up considerably. There was still some puffiness above my incision, which sort of made my stomach bulge out a little. It only showed when I stood up. The swollen area made a kind of a "shelf" where my stomach protruded and then went straight down underneath the incision. It made it look like I was a couple of months pregnant. This was bothersome to me, more visually than anything. I had got myself into pretty good shape before the surgery so I guess I was just being vain and wanting my tummy to be flatter.

The little ends of my dissolving stitches fell off around 5 weeks as well. This was a BIG relief. Being the hypochondriac that I am, I was starting to think they might have used the wrong kind. I was having visions of having stitches inside of me forever, or having to undergo some kind of painful procedure to have them removed. But lucky me … one day I just pulled on them and the little end popped off! I was elated and grossed out at the same time. Two feelings that seem to go together a lot during this whole experience.

I tried to take a photo every week, to two weeks. Unfortunately, I didn't write down exact dates when I was taking the photos.