At 28, I had my left kidney removed.

I don’t talk about it a lot with people outside of my circle, it’s not because I want to be private or I want it to be a secret.. I just assume no one really cared.

The reality for most chronically ill patients, you go through most of it alone.

I have spent months in hospital in my life, mostly through my late teens and my twenties. I have worked from hospital beds, pushed through chronic pain to run Auctions on a Saturday, sold houses from the ICU, stood at open homes in septic shock knowing full well I would be leaving that inspection and driving myself straight to the ER. And for the most part, no one really knew.

I have three very close friends who I would notify and they would step up and take the reins for me quietly and I was usually back at work within a few days of being released from hospital.

I had surgery and was at work the next day.

Now, I know what some are going to say because guys, I have heard it all before “no amount of money is worth your health.” The thing is, without that income, I couldn’t pay for health care. Chronically ill people without financial support don’t have the freedom to rest and relax at a home because we have a cold. I had complex, chronic and long term kidney failure. There was nothing anyone could do except keep me alive until the organ was dead enough to justify removing. The medical system does not like doing this before you’ve had kids, let me tell you. I went through hell before we got the go ahead to cut the damn thing out. And you know the part that caught me by surprise..

I grieved for my kidney. I grieved the life of being a sick person, because it was all I had known.

Survival mode was my only mode, I’ve never had the freedom to rest, relax and recover before now. I had a vital organ cut out of my abdomen and two weeks later I was at an auction, working. And this was my reality, my entire life.

I am currently 31 years old. I don’t usually like disclosing or discussing my age, but to make the point I want to make.. I was diagnosed with kidney failure at 21 after five years of searching for answers as to why I was so sick.

My initial surgery was expository as no scan would pick any visible issues up and my surgeon found almost a thousand micro kidney stones lining the wall of the organ.

What followed from that about six weeks later was what we like to call a re-implatation and the ureter into my bladder, and holy fuck I woke up from that surgery and the only thing I can remember thinking is “How can a human being be in this much pain, and still be alive…”

Sometimes I want to leave all of the suffering, the heart break, the feeling trapped in a dying body behind. Sometimes I want to pretend like this isn’t my story.. But everyday, the multitudes of scars across my abdomen remind me that getting here was not easy. Having this wonderful life with an incredible man was not something that was handed to me on a silver platter.

When my failed kidney was removed, I went from being a chronically ill person occasionally fighting for her life, to someone who was well.

I went from someone who had every excuse in the world to fail, to someone who was now petrified of failure because I had no excuse anymore.

But I also know what you can accomplish in a day even faced with the biggest if adversities in this life. I know you can go from broke, paying for your admission fee in gold coins from the piggy bank to owning a house, your dream car and having the life of your dreams by being strategical and tenacious. If I can get through to one person who is on the other side of that fence ad help them find a place of power.. All of my struggle was worth it.

Maybe one day..

But until I decide to pour my heart out and make myself cry from reflecting on my twenties, I hope you enjoy this quick snapshot of what it feels like to be free of illness.

Lots of love.

Sarah x