"It's all part of the process"

On May 28th I had my extremely stressful, and extremely confusing "assessment" for UC Davis Transplant services. This was big. Big enough for me to show early to Dialysis and only run for one out of my three hours, scheduled to finish at noon the next day with a two hour Saturday sesh. I was running late. I was doing my make up and changing in the car, and we didn't really know where we were going. UCdavis has a satelite site in Walnut Creek that I was lucky enough to wait two months for an appointment at, at an inconvineint time. As my mom and I rushed to a medical offfice we weren't familiar with, we argued and bitched, because thats what we do when we're stressed, and lately we're always stressed. We got there at exactly 11:15, exactly 15 minutes late. These appointments are similar to job interviews, only instead of making money I'm being paid in Kidney. My first interview was with the Social Worker, who was compelled by my story and assumingly loved me from the start. Next we filled out paperwork with the Nurse, then went in to see the Doctor. He was rude, and pushy, and didn't think I knew anything about my first transplant or my medical history. I did. I knew everything. Through the appointment there was limited (but not less upsetting) bad news, and aside from the RN calling my Mom fat and telling her to quit smoking (Bitch) and informing Dad of his high blood pressure, we were content and left hopeful that soon I would start testing donors at our new hospital.

Precisely two weeks later we got a letter from UCdavis, THE letter. When Mom informed me of the news, we were at a family shindig, and she had decided not to bring it along. All I could think about was what the contents of that letter would show. After the longest car ride home EVER from San Ramon, I rushed to the mail box, and tore open my letter. I skimmed ahead and read the very last word I wanted to read.

UNFORTUNATELY

I was rejected. We had lost our best option. I no longer have hope, and I'm no longer excited. I no longer have something to keep my spirits up while I moan through the leg cramps, nothing to keep me smiling through the nausea, and nothing to keep me from crying when my body aches so bad I cant walk. So what do we do now? We visit UCSF in October-as planned. I'm just going to try and be less disappointed when they turn me down too.