Oakland man finds kidney on Craigslist
Woman willingly donates organ after answering ad
Instead of checking out Craigslist to find used furniture, musical instruments or electronics, an Oakland man used it to find something much more organic: A kidney.
After dealing with kidney problems his entire life, undergoing surgery and living on dialysis for about six years, 29-year-old freelance writer David Nicherie was desperate to find someone willing and able to donate him a healthy kidney.
Many of his family members were tested to see if they would be a match, and he tried everything from reaching out to strangers through the National Kidney Registry to starting a website linking donors with potential recipients.
Finally, he struck gold through an ad in the Bay Area Craigslist’s “volunteers” section. It linked him to 30-year-old Newport Beach resident Jessica Morris, who said she would be happy to help. On Tuesday, surgery at the UCSF Medical Center at Parnassus delivered Morris’ healthy kidney to Nicherie.
He was still recovering from
the transplant operation Friday morning and experiencing sporadic pain but said he’s excited at the prospect of being able to live a healthy, dialysis-free life.
“I look at this as the beginning of a long journey and the ending of another one,” Nicherie said. “The pain just reminds me that I have a gift from somebody who saved my life. I’ve never felt more grateful.”
Morris was discharged from the hospital Friday morning but stuck around to spend time with Nicherie and his family. The two consider each other family now and hope for a lifelong friendship.
“He has a part of me now, so we’ll probably be close for the rest of our lives,” Morris said.
In a way, Morris and Nicherie were searching for each other.
Morris had been looking for someone to donate her kidney to for about three years before Nicherie came along, she said. Watching her father struggle with cancer inspired her to give back.
“My dad had cancer, and I saw a few people pass away of cancer, and kidney failure is very similar to it,” Morris said. “People are dying, they’re suffering, and it’s destroying their families, but there’s a treatment for it. I’ve always thought if you have the power to help someone and save a life, why not?”
Morris reached out to two other potential recipients, but one lived too far away and another did not respond. She then saw Nicherie’s ad around January; somebody had posted it on a Facebook page for potential kidney donors.
Morris said it was important to her that she get to know the person who would receive her kidney.
“You don’t always get the option to meet your recipient. As a donor, the only thing you have to gain is emotional, so if you don’t know where it’s going, it’s kind of a pointless procedure,” Morris said.
Before connecting with Morris, Nicherie was spending up to eight hours three days a week on dialysis. He was diagnosed in 2012 with an autoimmune disorder, which caused him to sink into depression.
“When it first happened, I didn’t take it that seriously. I assumed it was something I could take a pill for and deal with the rest of my life,” Nicherie said. “Six years later, it’s the hardest experience I’ve ever gone through. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone.”
Posting the Craigslist ad was a “shot in the dark,” he said. He didn’t expect anything to come out of it but wanted to cover all of his bases.
“I didn’t think a single person would get back to me. I thought if anyone would get back to me it would be a joke or a scammer,” Nicherie said. “I got about 150 responses, most of them were from people who wanted money or to be paid for a kidney, which is a crime.”
Morris’ response, was different. She sounded sincere, he said, and explained to him that she was serious about it.
Nicherie was caught off guard by her response, he said, because she wanted to know about his life and what he was going through. Now he understands why.
“She gave a piece of her body to me. I could not have imagined doing this experience with a random stranger who just showed up at the hospital,” Nicherie said.
The two emailed each other and registered through UCSF’s organ donor exchange program. They met in person in April when Morris went to the hospital for testing.
To ensure a successful transplant, doctors have to test to make sure the recipient’s antibodies are compatible with the new kidney, said Dr. Sang-Mo Kang, who performed the surgery.
Though Nicherie could have continued his dialysis and finding a new kidney was not an immediate lifeor-death issue, not having to rely on dialysis will lead to a “much different quality of life,” Kang said.
Nicherie said the experience has inspired him to help others like him. He plans to do that through his website, findakidneydonor.com, which aims to connect people seeking kidneys with donors and offer emotional support to people living on dialysis.
More than 661,000 people in the United States have kidney failure, according to the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases. Of those, 468,000 are on dialysis.
“I saw death in the eye, and now that I’ve seen what it looks like and what it feels like and what more than half a million people in America go through every day, I realized I can’t turn my back on it,” Nicherie said. “She gave me this new purpose in life.”