‘It’s like a light switch has been turned on’
Thanks to a friend’s ‘selfless act,’ an Ellicott City woman has hope after kidney transplant
Aplan for surprising an Ellicott City woman with the best news of her life was nearly foiled before it could be set in motion.
After living with chronic kidney disease for a decade, Hollys Allen, 59, was accidentally tipped off during a medical checkup that she would be getting a kidney transplant from a living donor.
“Someone who thought I knew I was getting a kidney asked, ‘You don’t know who your donor is?’ ” recalled Allen, an engineering contractor working on NASA’s Restore-L mission, which will endeavor to launch a robotic spacecraft in 2020 to refuel a live satellite.
For Allen, who had languished for four years on a national organ transplant list, this was an incredible revelation. But she was mystified as to who the person could be.
Allen’s husband, Rex, was the first to undergo living donor testing two years ago, but was excluded. Other relatives and friends who came forward were also rejected for various reasons.
With 95,000 of the 113,000 people currently registered with a national transplantation network waiting for a kidney, according to the Department of Health and Human Services, Allen could feel time slipping away from her.
Meanwhile, Jeannette Kendall had gone through the rigorous testing process without telling her close friend and Turf Valley neighbor.
Kendall, 60, is founder and executive director of Success in Style, a nonprofit that provides business attire and coaching to disadvantaged individuals seeking employment with profits from its four apparel resale shops in historic Savage Mill.
Kendall learned she’d been approved as a donor about the same time news of the transplant was leaked to Allen, but she couldn’t break away from work to deliver the news in person. She also has a busy personal life as a mother of nine.
Two weeks later, on Nov. 12, Kendall texted her friend that she and her husband would like to stop by, arousing Allen’s suspicions.
Allen still becomes emotional when she recounts the visit that changed her life.
“I open the door and there’s Jeannette and Paul Kendall with flowers and champagne,”
Allen said, her body shaking. “I was so totally overwhelmed that Jeannette would do this for me.”
Kendall said donating a kidney in April was one of the best things to happen — to her.
“People don’t realize the donor is getting a great gift, too,” Kendall said. “Knowing I would be the one to save Hollys’s life …” she began, her voice trailing off, “was one of the best gifts I’ve ever gotten.”
Allen got the good news from Kendall just months after friends threw her a party at Bippy’s Pub on Route 40 to rally community support.
Everyone wore matching bright green T-shirts with white lettering that read, “Help Hollys Find A Kidney” on the front, and had blood type O and a phone number on the back. They also created a Facebook page to spread the word.
Even though Kendall was already deep into the testing process, she attended the party so people wouldn’t wonder why she didn’t show up.
But further testing soon revealed what seemed like a deal-breaker: Kendall’s blood doesn’t contain antibodies that Allen’s does, so Allen’s blood would attack Kendall’s kidney if she donated it.
Fortunately, that wasn’t the end of the road.
Doctors at the Johns Hopkins Comprehensive Transplant Center in Baltimore recommended Kendall consider paired kidney exchange, also known as “kidney swap.”
See KIDNEY, page 5
After living with chronic kidney disease for a decade, Hollys Allen, 59, was accidentally tipped off during a medical checkup that she would be getting a kidney transplant from a living donor.
“Someone who thought I knew I was getting a kidney asked, ‘You don’t know who your donor is?’ ” recalled Allen, an engineering contractor working on NASA’s Restore-L mission, which will endeavor to launch a robotic spacecraft in 2020 to refuel a live satellite.
For Allen, who had languished for four years on a national organ transplant list, this was an incredible revelation. But she was mystified as to who the person could be.
Allen’s husband, Rex, was the first to undergo living donor testing two years ago, but was excluded. Other relatives and friends who came forward were also rejected for various reasons.
With 95,000 of the 113,000 people currently registered with a national transplantation network waiting for a kidney, according to the Department of Health and Human Services, Allen could feel time slipping away from her.
Meanwhile, Jeannette Kendall had gone through the rigorous testing process without telling her close friend and Turf Valley neighbor.
Kendall, 60, is founder and executive director of Success in Style, a nonprofit that provides business attire and coaching to disadvantaged individuals seeking employment with profits from its four apparel resale shops in historic Savage Mill.
Kendall learned she’d been approved as a donor about the same time news of the transplant was leaked to Allen, but she couldn’t break away from work to deliver the news in person. She also has a busy personal life as a mother of nine.
Two weeks later, on Nov. 12, Kendall texted her friend that she and her husband would like to stop by, arousing Allen’s suspicions.
Allen still becomes emotional when she recounts the visit that changed her life.
“I open the door and there’s Jeannette and Paul Kendall with flowers and champagne,”
Allen said, her body shaking. “I was so totally overwhelmed that Jeannette would do this for me.”
Kendall said donating a kidney in April was one of the best things to happen — to her.
“People don’t realize the donor is getting a great gift, too,” Kendall said. “Knowing I would be the one to save Hollys’s life …” she began, her voice trailing off, “was one of the best gifts I’ve ever gotten.”
Allen got the good news from Kendall just months after friends threw her a party at Bippy’s Pub on Route 40 to rally community support.
Everyone wore matching bright green T-shirts with white lettering that read, “Help Hollys Find A Kidney” on the front, and had blood type O and a phone number on the back. They also created a Facebook page to spread the word.
Even though Kendall was already deep into the testing process, she attended the party so people wouldn’t wonder why she didn’t show up.
But further testing soon revealed what seemed like a deal-breaker: Kendall’s blood doesn’t contain antibodies that Allen’s does, so Allen’s blood would attack Kendall’s kidney if she donated it.
Fortunately, that wasn’t the end of the road.
Doctors at the Johns Hopkins Comprehensive Transplant Center in Baltimore recommended Kendall consider paired kidney exchange, also known as “kidney swap.”
See KIDNEY, page 5
PREVIOUS ARTICLE
