AN EXCERPT FROM THE RELUCTANT DONOR: (NOW AN EBOOK)

I threw the kickboard aside and resumed my swimming. I coughed up water because I was crying again. Good, I thought grimly. Maybe I will drown and then I won’t have to give her a kidney. Serves you right if you drown, you stupid fool, I told myself. You know you won’t give her a kidney.

That’s it! JoAnn knows me. She will understand. I can get out of it!

I gave her false hope, and I was sorry, but JoAnn knows what a coward I am. She would realize how frightened I was of hospitals, blood and guts. I shivered in the pool just thinking of the smell of illness.

I can’t have surgery – elective surgery. Yeah, maybe I’d have to have surgery if I ruptured an appendix, but then I’d be in pain so I wouldn’t know the difference. Surgery means risk to me. I don’t take risks. And, I’m not obligated because I can’t give away a part of myself. And, I bet the doctors will not allow it with our family history of PKD. Whew – I’ll be able to get out of it. She can put her name on the waiting list for a transplant.

WHAT PEOPLE ARE SAYING ABOUT THE RELUCTANT DONOR:

“If you want to be inspired, simply turn the page.” -Sanjay Gupta, MD, CNN Chief Medical Correspondent

“More than ever, it seems we are looking for hope. We look for hope in our families, at our workplace…”