Feb 13, 2016 4 min read

Heather Bobik and Julio Sanchez had planned to celebrate Valentine’s Day 2015 with dinner and a movie.

Instead, they spent it in the hospital.

Regardless, it was still the sweetest day of their four-year relationship.

That’s the day Heather, then 32, received a new kidney.

Today, Heather plans to celebrate the one-year anniversary of her transplant with Julio and her mother, who has traveled from Virginia to mark the occasion, with a quiet dinner.

“When I look back, it’s just a blur,” the Washington woman said. “I look back like it was nothing, but it was something.”

Heather’s kidney function, the result, she said, of numerous infections, was less than 10 percent when she started dialysis 10 years ago.

For nearly eight years, she was on in-home, round-the-clock dialysis, which caused numerous side effects, such as headaches and fatigue, that often were debilitating.

She expected to receive a kidney transplant in July 2014, but the donor, who had reached out to Heather through Facebook months earlier about donating her kidney, backed out at the last minute.

“I just figured I was going to spend the rest of my life on dialysis,” Heather said.

Unfortunately, her condition started to worsen, but finally, on Feb. 13, 2015, she got the phone call for which she had been awaiting for 2 1/2 years.

“My dialysis coordinator couldn’t reach me, but my mom finally did,” Heather said. “She told me they had a kidney for me, and she said, ‘Call your coordinator.'”

Heather texted Julio, who was at a friend’s house. She merely said, “Read this: I have a kidney. Come get me.”

Heather was given a two-hour window to arrive at the hospital.

“She spent so many years on dialysis,” Julio said. “There were days she’d be down, but I didn’t let her get down too much. The situation was bad, but we made it through.”

After Heather awakened from the anesthesia, the doctor told her the kidney did not take immediately. If it didn’t start working in three months, it meant her body would reject it. From the time it took Heather to be transported from the operating room to her own room, the kidney started to work.

“It was one of the hardest surgeries I’ve ever had,” Heather said. “They rip you open. I was bawling. I felt like I was 6 months old. I had no balance.”

After spending several days in the hospital, Heather moved to the hospital’s nearby family house. Lab work was done every day to prevent infection and rejection.

However, about a month after the transplant, Heather began to experience mild rejection. She is scheduled to have a kidney biopsy Wednesday to measure her creatinine level and determine the level of rejection. Creatinine is found in the blood and helps the kidneys filter waste efficiently. When there is kidney damage or kidney disease, creatinine levels tend to become elevated.

“My creatinine level runs a bit higher, just because the person who donated the kidney was heavier and the veins were constricted,” Heather said. “If I’m sick and I don’t drink a lot, my creatinine goes up, and I’m really, really tired.”

Heather’s body has experienced many changes since the transplant.

She quickly gained 30 pounds after the surgery because of fluid retention, but managed to lose the weight. Before the surgery, it could be 85 degrees outside, and Heather would be cold; now, she’s hot. Heather would always eat ice, and she loved soda; not so much anymore.

Although she no longer needs dialysis, Heather continues to take her share of pills, including anti-rejection medication. Before the transplant, the most pills she took were 36, including six each time she ate. She also requires blood work once a month.

“I don’t know what I was expecting,” Heather said. “I’m still up there with the meds. I just don’t have to take them as often.”

And she’ll have to wait for the biopsy results to determine what treatment protocol lies ahead.

“I’m young. Who’s to say how long it’s going to last?” she said. “I’m just going to take it a day at a time.”