‘I Got a Second Chance’: Tampa Woman Takes Last Flight Home to Receive Kidney Transplant
A few weeks ago, MJ was coming back from his long vacation in Egypt. But something different happened before MJ got off the plane.
A flight attendant told the cabin they were letting off a woman from the back of the plane first. Why? She was on her way to get a new kidney at Tampa General Hospital.
MJ took out his phone to record video. In the video, you can hear the cabin erupt in applause as the woman, Jendy Abreu, left the plane.
Jendy heard that MJ and the crew talked about this video on the air and called into the show. She came in to the studio to talk about her journey on Friday.
Jendy said she received a call about an available kidney after waiting 17 months for a new one. Jendy said she was diagnosed with membranoproliferative glomerulonephritis (MPGN) at 9-years-old, which is when your immune system attacks your organs. She told MJ and the crew she had her first transplant at 25, but it rejected about a year ago. That’s when she began was dialysis 3 times a week.
“No one tells you what to do or what to say,” she said about her first reaction when she got the call about an available kidney. She said she hopped on the last plane available from JFK to TPA.
Jendy said the cadaver kidney is the same age as her. But other than that, she’s not sure about who the person was.
“Whoever the family is out there, I just think about them every day. She lives through me now.”
Here’s the full video from this morning.
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