Judy Matlock-Liles
Born with a congenital birth defect, my first natural kidney failed in 1964 when I was 12 years old. My remaining kidney survived my teen years and into my early twenties when it failed and I began hemodialysis in 1976.
In 1981 I received my first cadaveric kidney transplant in Houston, TX. Nine months after the surgery I climbed Longs Peak (elevation: 14,256 feet) in the Rocky Mtns. with my husband, Charlie. And in 1985 I gave birth to our only child, Jonathan. At that time about fifty transplant recipients had given birth in the U.S., and I was the first in Mississippi. The stress of the pregnancy caused chronic rejection and in 1989 I received my second transplant.
For the past 21 years I have had a creatinine of less than 1.1, and am anticipating the day when my nephrologist will be younger than my kidney transplant!