Side Effects

I wrote earlier that we are three generations of PKD and I just want to talk a little about my mother-in-law. She found out she had PKD when she was in her 30's and had the exact same procedures that James is going through right now. She went into kidney failure and had her kidneys out by the same doctors and same hospital. She was 46 when she finally had her transplant and that was coming on 8 years ago. When it comes to her new kidney, she is doing great. It's the side effects of all this that have really taken the toll on her.
A few years ago she developed a very rare side effects to the anti-rejection drugs that all transplant candidates must take. She lost her hair. It was very hard to see because she had always prided herself on her long beautiful hair. It was tough for her, as I'm sure you can imagine. She also has, what one doctor called, "A tortured colon". I can't say this definitively, but I think that is because when they cut her down the middle to take out her kidneys, they also took out her intestines. Those are impossible to put back in exactly the same way and she has suffered terribly because of this. This week it happened again. She just gets agonizing pain and what my mom likes to call, "lower abdominal distress".
It just makes me remember that while we want to think that once he has this transplant, all his problems will finally go away, but there are side effects that he will also have to face. PKD isn't going to go away just because the kidneys are gone, unfortunately.