I had always been sickly as a child suffering mostly with pain in my legs and going to many doctors with my father which didn't help much except that I had numerous operations to my legs to straighten them without any of the doctors trying to figure out why this was happening in the first place.At about age 15 I went to the famous Groote Schuur hospital ( first heart transplant) for about 2 weeks and they checked everything to find out once and for all what the problem was,and after lots of examinations including a very painful biopsy I was diagnosed with 'fanconi type syndrome' which I was told is quite rare. I was informed that I might suffer from kidney failure but at a very later stage which I understood as maybe in my 50's which turned out to be way off unfortunately.
Coming back to 1995 lying in hospital after collapsing in one of my customers shops, a young not so bright doctor told me that they will keep me in hospital until they find a kidney and then do a transplant which apart from making me feel worse was also a lot of nonsense. As the days progressed and I was told by the senior nephrologist about dialysis and all other relevant info I was still shocked but felt better knowing that at least I would be able to go and look after my family.
The reason I'm doing this website is to help people know that things are not as bad as they seem initially and to provide anyone seeking answers with info to avoid them going through the hell I went through the first few months and later after my first transplant, for eg. I was let to believe that once I had a transplant all would be ok, which of course is not true because a lot of things can happen immediately or after the transplant which if you are not prepared for can break you, and your family.
If you have any questions or need any info please feel free to ask me until I write my next blog in about a fortnight, in the meantime be positive and always be thankful for everything because things can always be worse.
Emmanuel