Update: Sadly beautiful Crystal (below) never received a kidney and passed away last month. We are resharing this story in the hopes the other mom featured can find a donor. sweetbuffalo.smblu.com/buffalo-mom-who-wished-for-kidney-to-have-more-time-with-daughter-sadly-loses-battle-to-lupus/
Being a mom is a difficult job in itself, but imagine being a mom who has to fight an illness every day.
That’s sadly the case for two amazing Western New York moms who are in desperate need of kidney donors.
Crystal Allen of Buffalo
Allen is the mom to beautiful 3-year-old girl. Allen has an amazing smile and wonderful outlook on life, so it’s hard to believe she’s been fighting lupus since she was 19 years old. At age 21, she had to spend five months in the hospital due to complications.
“I had to spend the remainder of my twenties having late night emergency room visits and hospital stays.”
Surprisingly at the age of 31, Allen found out she was pregnant. She was deemed high risk and would have to have weekly appointments to keep track of her and her daughter’s health. At her 30 week appointment, she found out her kidneys were failing.
“I was rushed to labor and delivery and there I gave birth to my 2 pound, 9 ounce baby girl. She was taken to NICU and I to Buffalo General to start dialysis.”
Her doctors decided to let Allen’s body recover first and she started dialysis in November 2014.
“My daughter was 6 months. My daughter has grown up knowing that mommy goes to dialysis and sometimes the ‘hos-si-bo.’ My wish is to receive a transplant someday soon. I don’t want this to be a memory for her.”
Allen is blood type O. If you are interested in becoming a donor, you may contact her at styals82@gmail.com.
Anna McCarthy Schwartz
Schwartz is a mom to 3-year-old, Eloise, who she had three weeks early because of high creatinine levels.
“It was then discovered that I inherited my family’s genetic kidney disease.”
This unknown disease has been part of Schwartz’s family for generations. Her father found out he was afflicted by it when she was 3 years old, but fortunately found a donor shortly after.
After her father passed a year and a half ago, Schwartz decided to do some research. It was through this research and genetic testing by a doctor on rare types of kindney disease that she found out her family is only one of 200 families in the world with a rare form of kidney disease that is caused by a gene mutation and her daughter has a 50 percent chance of getting it as well.
“I am lucky. I am young, otherwise healthy, and have a fulfilling career, supportive friends and family, and young daughter who does a great job of distracting me from the disappointment, anger and frustration I have felt since being diagnosed.”
Schwartz says she hopes to find a kidney donor soon so she can go back to her normal self and teach her daughter that with enough persistence and hope, she can also get through anything life throws at her.
Schwartz is blood type O. If you are interested in becoming a donor, you may contact her at 716-563-3764 or awmschwartz@gmail.com.
