Day of transplant 23/12/2008

A doctor once said that to have a transplant (in my case liver transplant) you had to be sick enough to need it in order to live, but well enough to survive it.
That's how I was on Dec 23rd 2008, hospitalized from the day before, after a year long of hospitalizations and doctors visits and without strengh anymore to get out of bed. According to my other transplanted friends, everyone is in the same condition more of less. I had encephalopaty, vasculitis, and a chain of other problems that goes along with a liver that doesn't work.
Still, I tried to be in good spirits, and on that day, sitting in my hospital bed surrounded by my family, a few doctors entered to give me the news that they had a liver for me and I was surprised. I didn't know I was so ahead in the list, they had put me on that waiting list on September, only three months ago.
That was at 6:00 pm and at 9:00 pm I was already going in the surgery room, scared, nervious and hoping I would make it. I am not sure the exact time I woke up, but I know that around 8 am I was already trying to talk to the nurses in ICU. That was Dec. 24th, the first day of my life after a liver transplant.
I was only 15 days in the hospital after that, I felt great from the very beginning, and I went home full of thanks for the chance to live, for the solidarity of the people that made that possible and for the care given to me by hospital staff.
Now it's been two years and 3 months. The doctors visit are still every two to three months, and I have had 3 biopsies, 2 MRI's, and other non invasive test to make sure that my body says the same thing I do: I am doing good. Sometimes I wonder if doctors just don't believe what you tell them, and the more I watch the series House the more my doctors start looking a lot like him to me.
Well, I sign off my first entry. I will write tomorrow a little bit about my everyday life.
Essie