"You have a kidney in there?"

Still no news. I called the coordinator today and the cross matching is still pending.

However, I did want to tell my mailing story. It happened weeks ago when I had just gotten my blood taken for the cross matching. I was standing in line waiting for my turn. It went pretty much like this:

Woman in front of me: "That's an interesting package."
Me: "Yeah. I am trying to donate my kidney to my sister."
Woman: Oh my god, you have a kidney in there!?"
Me: "What?"

Haha. I couldn't have planned it better myself :)

Unknowns

I feel like there are so many unanswered questions. I have tried to look on line and research it but I found that there is not a lot of information on the donor besides "I donated, it went well, everyone's happy." I did find a a few blogs with videos. These were great but I wish there were more scenarios with different situation. Donors don't seem to be followed and studied on the long term. What information is out there, is a little sparse.

Here are some of my questions:

How does it feel before surgery? Obviously everyone will be different but it would be nice to read about.
How soon will my sister and I be able to see each other afterwards?
How much help will we need on a daily basis right afterwards? and for how long?
I have read once that donors often go through a sort of mourning for the lost organ. Is this common and if so how long does it last?
Do I meet with the psychologists post surgery?
I heard somewhere that the normal discharge is after 2 days, can it really be that short?
How soon after can I fly home?
Are there any changes to my daily life even small things that aren't necessarily a big deal but would still be nice to know?
I've read that women can safely have pregnancies after transplants but is it a little different because of this? Will I have to be monitored more? Are C-sections more likely? Could I have an at home birth if I wanted to?
Will health care be more difficult to find now or more expensive?
Once fully recovered are there any strenuous activities that are recommended you never do as a result of the transplant?

In the mean time, I keep myself occupied by reading about the recipients and autoimmune diseases in general.

Initial Testings

So far I am still in the infant stage of the process. I filled out the paper for consideration not quite a year ago. A month back I got a call asking what myself and my family thought of the transplant. Did we have someone in particular who we though would be the best candidate? My answer to this was no. I believe we all just filled out the forms hoping one of us would be a match. However, in my mind I seem like the most logical choice. I am young, healthy, don't have any children to take care of, I'm not in school, and my job is aware that I applied for this and they supported me. Her response to this was "Great, because you are our first choice!" 

After that there was a lot of information given to me on that initial call. I don't really know how much sunk in but I understood that the next step was cross matching of our blood types. If I passed this step then I would fly to Florida where the surgery will take place and undergo a full range of medical and psychological tests. Two weeks after that a board would decide yes or no and the surgery would be scheduled. 

Both of our bloods have been mailed off and someone who works with my coordinator told me we might have an answer tomorrow. Fingers crossed!