Benhan

Ben's kidney transplant

-By Benhan David Inbaraj

On that day May 19th, 2023, I went through a Kidney transplant surgery and would like to share my life’s story and how God could work in mysterious ways.

Got a call from the Hospital by 5:30am that I had a kidney ready “go and get it”.

In 2018 I was diagnosed with chronic kidney disease and in 2019, God opened a miraculous way to come to the US. My kidney function was stable with diet but in July 2022, I got severe swelling in my face and went for a doctor visit and they found that both my kidneys failed and asked me to rush to emergency. I was admitted in hospital for 5 days and they gave medications to remove toxins from blood and did a kidney biopsy and found that due to Iga nephropathy (which is an autoimmune disorder)caused kidney disease and they were totally damaged and had no way to cure them. I was put on high doses of immunosuppressants and faced a lot of health issues due to kidney diet, I was unable to walk properly due to joint pains and back pain and also had severe hair fall, Due to kidney diet. Side effects of prednisone resulted in moon face. My face muscles hardened and pained.

But none of the medications or diet worked out.  Everything failed and my kidney function continued to decline.

The only option left was  transplant. We had to enroll for transplant on Jan 5 2023 in Virginia Mason Medical center, Seattle and the average waiting time for a kidney is 3 - 6 years. 

So in the meantime I had to start dialysis, so I went through surgery for a PD catheter on March 7, 2023 in St. Micheals medical center, Silverdale. 

I ended up in dialysis in March 2023. I was sent to Davita Home dialysis unit in Olympia and had PD dialysis training and started dialysis. Everyday I had to prepare my catheter by following the steps to sanitize it and connect it to the PD dialysis cycler machine and I have to be connected with it for at least 8 hrs every night. I used to start the cycler by 6:00PM, connect the dialysate bags to get it warmed up. Around 9:00PM I will connect the transfer set to the cycler and start the dialysis process. Everyday 8000ml of dialysate was pushed into my peritoneum.

4 cycles of 2000ml.

20min drain

15min to fill 2000ml dialysate

2 hrs dwell time and this process repeats.

I had some drain pain which caused me sleepless nights. Some days due to sleeping position drain/fill won’t happen properly, the system will sound an alarm which makes me wake up and restart the process.

I never slept well even one day in those days.

Also it changed my lifestyle and made me stay in my room for a long time. Due to lack of sleep I used to sleep during the day. Due to changes in diet by increasing protein which helped a lot and my joint pain started to reduce and hair fall started to reduce.

Within 2 months of dialysis, on May 19 2023 I got a call from the Hospital by 5:30am that I had a kidney ready “go and get it”. My Anna family and us left for the hospital, not knowing what is happening and what is going to happen. We had a lot of queries but no one was able to answer them. 

When we reached the hospital they started to prepare me and took me to the surgery room by 5:00PM. The surgery was completed successfully by 11:30PM. By 2:30am I remember seeing the clock. I was still under the onset of anesthesia, I couldn’t open my mouth as they placed a tube in my throat through my mouth during surgery. I was given water and ice. It took a few more hours for the anesthesia to clear. By 10 AM on May 21, God gave me strength to get up from the bed. God gave fast recovery and favor in the eyes of doctors and nurses and they discharged me on May 23, before the expected day. Patients on both sides of my room in the hospital were tested positive for Covid and the entire floor was under Covid restriction, but God protected me like an apple of an eye.

We felt his mighty plan and his hand upon us and how he executed everything smoothly, in his own way. Whatever we tried, all ended up in failure. Sometimes I felt prayers were not being heard.  But His plans were higher than we thought, we thought we would get a call after 3 years but we got a good kidney transplant within 2 months of dialysis.

On May 26, 2023 night 11:30 PM, I noticed my PD catheter was filled with blood, so we rushed to the emergency room. I was there till 4:45 AM in the morning. They did all the tests and since there were no symptoms they asked to do till the catheter is removed. God protected us from all dangers of getting infected from that.

On June 6, 2023, I had my next surgery to remove a stent in urinary bladder and PD catheter removal and God was with us and it went well, and now I’m now without any external pipes connected. God gave perfect surgeons, nephrologists, anesthesiologists and Nurse teams at the right time.

Thanks to all our New Testament Church Tacoma, Sisters and believers, Family for standing and supporting us in these tough situations with prayers and taking care of kids.

This is to testify that He is answering our prayer and doing miracles. 

Benhan - His Ways, My Journey