A Brief History...

As many of you know Blake was born with kidney disease (chronic renal failure). After a short time on dialysis, when Blake was 5 years old, my mom donated her kidney to him. That was 15 years ago and recently we were faced with the reality that dialysis and eventually a new kidney was inevitable.
Blake started dialysis in February and the process of finding a new donor was started. My brother Brad and my dad were both the first to step up and offer to start the donation process. After some paper work and a simple blood test the results showed that both my dad and my brother were matches and that they both matched in 3 out of 6 categories. The transplant team made the decision to go with my dad since he was older. This would allow for more donor options in the future.

This, of course, was exactly the way my dad wanted to see things go, and understandably. However, I have to say that I respect my brother so much, even more then I did before. He stepped up to the plate knowing full well what the end result was, and he not only did it for Blake but also for the rest of the family. He said he did not want us girls (Shirley, Dawnel and Noel) to have to make the decision to donate. He knew we would have done whatever was necessary for Blake, but he wanted to make it easy on us. What a true act of love! And also to mention his wife, Sarah, and her dedication to not only her husband but to the family. I know it would not have been easy to let my brother go through this process, but she was unselfish and supportive the entire time. We are truly blessed to have a family that loves each other so much!
So here we are one week and 3 days away from transplant. My dad passed all his tests with flying colors and we are ready to roll. The surgery date is set for Thursday, July 17th at UCLA Medical. I have set up this website to help keep everyone updated with the progress and what is going on. I will keep you updated as I hear new things.

Here are a few pictures of Blake before surgery and his dialysis gear. This just gives you a small idea on what he has been going through.

This is Blake's whole set up. He spends about 10 or so hours as day in his room doing dialysis. The big bags you see with fluid fill his body cavity up and through osmosis, pull out the toxins in his system.
The actually "brains" of the dialysis machine.

This is the port used for dialysis.