Hi Everyone,

My experience with the virus has been a bit odd. Mostly, it has mostly not affected me as I am in home isolation due to my medical situation (awaiting liver transplant), but I am also greatly affected as any further steps in my treatment have been paused.

For example, as a final stop to prepare for surgery I needed an anigiogram but no one was doing them. We finally managed to get in for one (quite odd waking up in an empty hospital ward) but it was pretty stressful as it ate up a 3 week window when a potential donor may have been available.

Based on my O- blood type and chemistry the donor pool is pretty small. My one brother was just notified that his apnea makes him unsuitable so we are moving on to testing my sister which takes 6-8 weeks. Oddly enough, I come from an adoptive family and we are not bio related but do have an initial match. Regardless, there is only about 20% chance of her being suitable so looking for a healthy liver is still my full time job.

My team is located at Toronto General, which is literally the best place in the world for living donor transplants. (And 4th best in world overall.) 800 performed so far with no major donor complications. As the liver grows back to full size and function in about 2-3 months I am really just looking for a loan!

As one part of my efforts, I have set up a website (savedanslife.com or .ca) that has had 40K or so unique visitors so far. Awareness if nothing else is a very good thing.

My team has also suggested, and I agreed, to get on the list for a Hep C liver from a deceased donor if one becomes available before a live donor is cleared. Experimental surgery but the theory is I would be way better off with a dead diseased liver than the way I am living right now.

I had no idea how important the liver is and it is almost totally debilitating when it fails. I intended to keep updating hubski on the reg but after I get my other shit done I just don't have the energy. I went for a one hour power walk three days ago and I am still hurting! Ridiculous. lol

Hope things are going well for you all of you! sgfc