Daughter Returns from War Zone to Give Mother Kidney

By Associated Press
November 18, 2006

Air Force Staff Sgt. Jodi Mennie, 31, was stationed at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan when she got the call in August.

Her mother, Flagstaff Deputy City Clerk Laura Matthews, said she had just 15 percent function left in her kidneys.

Matthews' kidneys had been slowly damaged by polycystic kidney disease, a genetic disease that runs rampant in her family. Matthews' youngest daughter, her father and all three of her brothers have the late-onset genetic disease.

Mennie was expecting the call, as Matthews used to tease her daughter about a possible kidney transplant.

"When she is doing something dangerous, I'd say, 'You better take care of my kidney,'" Matthews said.

Stationed just north of the Afghan capital, Mennie worried that she couldn't get the proper medical test while in the middle of a war zone. But while in Afghanistan, Mennie received a blood test to check for diabetes and an ultrasound to look for the type of cysts that riddled her mother's kidneys.

Later, she received extensive tests at the Mayo Clinic in Phoenix.

By Tuesday, one of Mennie's kidneys went to her mother in a life-saving transplant at the clinic. The surgery went well and both women are recovering as expected.

A familiar voice at countless city council meetings, Matthews will be missing for several months. With her constant sunny disposition and never missing a day of work, few knew she had been suffering over the last few months as cysts on her kidneys routinely burst, causing her tremendous pain.

Matthews knew that without a donor she would be resigned to start dialysis.

"I don't know how much time I would have (before having to go on dialysis), but it would have been a matter of months," Matthews said. "When you get down to 10 percent, you are pretty much forced to go on dialysis."

Unfortunately, the disease is also a family trait.

"My brothers all tease that we are going be on dialysis together, have our recliners all lined up together," Matthews said with a smile.

For Mennie, who does not have the condition, giving up a healthy kidney to a family member was always in the cards. It was only a question of when and to whom. When it came time to ask who would receive her kidney, it involved another form of sacrifice.

When her uncle, a detective in the Los Angeles area, began to experience renal failure, Mennie asked if he wanted her to get tested.

"He told me to wait; he knew mom was going to need one, too," Mennie said. "I was I had more, I wish I had more kidneys to give."

As the disease progressed, her uncle was forced to retire at the age of 50.

Matthews' father slowly died from polycystic kidney disease, undergoing dialysis for 13 years before he died.

"There were transplants in the early '80s, but there weren't many available at the time," Matthews said. "(My father) was never able to get a transplant, so he eventually died while on dialysis."

She acknowledges there would be a downside, but it's preferable to doing dialysis for several times a week, with each treatment last several hours.

"Weighing a life of living on immune suppressant drugs and a life on dialysis, I would much prefer the drugs _ it is no contest," Matthews said. "Having known members of my own family on dialysis, I've seen what it did to their general overall health and energy.

Mennie, who is an avionics specialist supervisor in the Air Force working on A-10 Thunderbolts, is now stationed at Spangdahlem Air Base, Germany.

She said her supervisors were understanding when she said she needed time off to donate her kidney.

After undergoing the surgery, Mennie will return to Germany and be taken care of by her boyfriend, who is also in the Air Force.

Matthews will stay at the Mayo Clinic for at least a month before returning to Flagstaff, where her youngest daughter will take care of her.

The deputy city clerk hopes more will consider donating organs to the hundreds on waiting lists.

"It is close to my heart," said Matthews, who is expected to return to work next year. "My father died because he never got a transplant, and my brother Steve may not be a good candidate for a transplant because of the dialysis. Many, many people die every year waiting for transplants of all kinds."