Woman Donated Kidney To Stranger After Seeing Facebook Request

A woman in her early thirties donated one of her kidneys to a stranger suffering from kidney failure after coming across a plea posted by the patient on Facebook.

Louise Sach, 30, from London, who was suffering from chronic kidney failure, is now more than just thankful to her donor Kayleigh Wakeling. They have become the best of friends.

Describing her ordeal in a recent interview with British national daily Mirror, Sach said she was diagnosed with the disease when she was just 8 years old, with her kidneys working only 40 percent.

“Doctors told my parents both my kidneys were only working at around 40 percent. They were small, functioning poorly and heavily scarred. They said I was never going to make it to ­adulthood with that set of kidneys,” said Sach. “I was unusual, though, because my kidney function didn’t decline for a long time. Although the tiredness and nausea increased, I was strong and stubborn, determined I would never let anyone see me as different.”

Sach’s condition became severe when her kidneys’ performance dropped at 13 percent in 2017. She now had to go through a kidney transplant. Many of her relatives came forward in a bid to help her, but they could not match the criteria required to become a potential donor. Sach, then, joined a deceased donor list.

“It was a long, terrifying wait, jumping every time my phone rang in case it was ‘the call’,” Sach said while describing her long pending wait.

Meanwhile, she created a Facebook page in January 2018, where she wrote about her story and asked viewers, if they could help her find someone who could donate her a kidney. Three days later, Wakeling reached out to Sach through a message offering her help.

“I saw Louise’s post when it was shared by a friend, and I’d never heard of altruistic donors before, but we are a similar age and I just thought, what if that was me or someone in my family?,” Wakeling said. “I was the same blood type as Louise, O ­positive, so I Googled to see if I could carry on normal life with just one kidney and everything I read said you could.”

Both of them, then, went to a local hospital to find out if Wakeling could be a potential donor for Sach. After undergoing several tests, the former was given a thumbs up for giving one of her kidneys to the latter. They were successfully operated June 1, and have now become best friends forever.

“I could see Louise looking better all the time, her skin tone changed color. I was in pain from the surgery but seeing that every day she was getting better was the best feeling,” said Wakeling. “What’s happened because of that one Facebook post has been incredible. It has completely changed my outlook on life.”