Support Cheryl Anne's Kidney Transplant Recovery

Cheryl Anne Burgess began her long and painful journey with kidney disease over 16 years ago. What began as a scary and difficult, yet manageable, condition eventually turned into complete kidney failure, when Cheryl Anne caught a cold in January of 2019 and her fragile kidneys could not handle any more stress and failed. When kidneys fail, the only option is dialysis which is a completely life-altering situation, especially for an otherwise healthy and active young woman.

For the last five and a half years, Cheryl Anne and her husband Kyle have had the daily reminder that she has a very serious and life-threatening illness. Each night, Cheryl Anne has had to be constrained to her dialysis routine to keep her alive. Dialysis is painful, it causes nausea and vomiting, it stresses the body physically and emotionally, it is necessary to survive, but it is Evil. Throughout all the obstacles that come with dialysis, Cheryl Anne and Kyle have gone about their daily life in a manner that people who interact with them on a daily basis would not even know anything was wrong. They wouldn’t tell people that they spend most nights with Cheryl Anne vomiting and in tears while Kyle helplessly does everything he can to alleviate the evening battle by turning on fans, grabbing hair ties and buckets while waiting for the moment to pass so they could finally get a few precious hours of sleep. To say they endured a difficult road is a dramatic understatement, as they have somehow managed to thrive where many would have given up.

Unfortunately, the only solution to dialysis is to get a kidney transplant, which is not an easy process. The road to getting on a transplant list has been a long and arduous battle in itself due to the complexities of her auto-immune disorders that have affected other vital organs as well. Luckily, Cheryl Anne and Kyle finally found a transplant center in Seattle that was willing to work with her. The transplant center wanted to work with her due to her youth and high activity level for a dialysis patient. There aren’t many dialysis patients that teach yoga, participate in striking classes and lift weights. Cheryl Anne is one of a kind and the stars finally aligned for her to get onto the transplant list after enduring extensive interview processes, numerous trips to Seattle, and undergoing surgery just to improve her chances of getting on the list. On July 17th of this year, Cheryl Anne was finally added to the active kidney list for a potential transplant and advised that she could start receiving calls in late Fall or early Winter.

Cheryl Anne and Kyle were ecstatic at this news and were beginning to rebuild their savings to prepare for the tremendous expense that comes with transplant surgery. Then another curveball, albeit a good one, was thrown their direction. After only two weeks of being on the active transplant list and thinking they had months to prepare, Cheryl Anne received a call for a matched kidney. Within 48 hours of receiving the call, Cheryl Anne and Kyle had packed up what they could, traveled to Seattle and Cheryl Anne underwent a successful kidney transplant!

Cheryl Anne and Kyle are extremely grateful and feel beyond blessed to receive such an amazing gift. Cheryl Anne is doing well early on in her recovery and adapting to her new kidney. She and Kyle will have to stay in Seattle for the next six weeks for observation, testing, and recovery and then remain in quarantine for three months post-transplant.

The accelerated timeline and the need to stay in Seattle for an extended period has placed a great financial stress upon them, so we are humbly asking for donations to help ease the burden as Cheryl Anne recovers. Thank you for all your help, thoughts, and continued prayers for Cheryl Anne and Kyle.

They feel all the love and appreciate you all. God Bless!