My kidney transplant is scheduled for early next week. And the to-do list keeps getting longer. When you know you won’t be leaving the house for public places for three months, you start to think about all the things other people won’t be able to do for you, or won’t want to do for you. Today it was stocking up on coffee beans from Stew Leonard’s and getting my last haircut. Tomorrow it’s my last trip into Manhattan for a couple of tech events and stops at two favorite lower East Side Jewish delis: Katz’s and Russ and Daughters. Thursday it’s a last bike ride with my other son, Benjamin. And we’re expecting Max either late tomorrow or Thursday as well. Friday he and I both have our final pre-ops.
So let me go back a week. Last week I was in Denver for a conference, but I got to stay with my donor, my son, my hero, Max. It was my first visit since he moved there with his significant other, Diana, a first year resident at the University of Colorado Medical Center who has been incredibly supportive of what Max is doing. Thank goodness. Max and I had a 
chance to get up to Mount Evans, my first visit to the beautiful turning aspens. Quite different from the reds and crimsons here in the Northeast, but stunning nonetheless. It was really great to have some serious time with Max before the even more serious stuff gets started later this week.
Yesterday my wife and I met with my surgeon, Doctor Yoo, at the Yale-New Haven Transplantation Center. He walked us through the surgical game plan chapter and verse, and didn’t pull any punches about the risks. But both of us acknowledged that while there are alternatives to getting the living donor donation, all of them are significantly worse. In case you’re not familiar with the procedure, and frankly there’s no reason you should be, they don’t remove your old kidneys. They put the new kidney into your groin, generally about where your appendix is. In my case they weren’t thrilled about the blood supply at the site, so they are opting to put it on my left side. Of course for the surgeon that’s a little like driving on the other side of the road, but Doctor Yoo assures me this is something he’s done before.
We talked about the recovery process. They don’t want me to lift anything heavier than a gallon of milk for about six weeks. Driving will take three or four weeks. And he said we’d negotiate over when I could go back to riding my stationary bike. We’ll be careful about visitors, asking them to take off their shoes and use hand sanitizer. Hugs and handshakes are out. Anyone with a cold, cough, or even a runny nose is asked to come back some other time. Doctor Yoo likened my condition to a premature baby home from the NICU weeks before he or she should have been born. The baby needs to build an immune system from scratch, and so will I. Interestingly he also cautioned against going overboard with surgical masks, rubber gloves, and the like. Though with both my wife and daughter working in the school system, we will have to be cautious about the germs they might bring home from sniffling students.
As I head into this final week I’m feeling great, and I’m very optimistic. I’m also a little overwhelmed at the amount of work I still need to clean off my desk and computer in the coming days. And yes, I’m scared. I’d be an idiot if I weren’t.
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