The gift of life that can happen with tragic death

March 30th, 6:00am March 31st, 5:13pm

Judy Murphy

Connacht Tribune

Lifestyle – Judy Murphy meets kidney transplant recipient Patrick Eustace whose life has been transformed by an organ donation

For most children, turning 12 is significant as it marks the final birthday before the onset of teenage life and the next step in the journey to adulthood. For Patrick Eustace, it was memorable for a different reason – that was the day he went on dialysis because his kidneys had stopped working.

Thirty-two-year Patrick, a Product Manager with tech giant Cisco in Oranmore, was born with a condition known as Kidney Dysplasia, which means that these vital organs had failed to develop in the womb.

As a child, his life revolved around visits to the doctor, Limerick Regional Hospital, and Crumlin’s Children’s Hospital while his parents, Peggy and Val, did everything in their power to keep him alive and healthy.

He was lucky in that his kidneys did function for 12 years, albeit in a limited way. But eventually even that stopped, so dialysis was needed.

Twenty years on, Patrick is a healthy young man, who will shortly be celebrating his first wedding anniversary. Living in Ballinderreen in South Galway with his wife Áine, the Ennis native has achieved a great deal and has much to look forward to.

But his health and rich life would not have been possible without a kidney transplant which he received six months after going on dialysis. Patrick never forgets that, and on his wedding day last July, he paid special tribute to his donor and to the donor’s family, whose decision in the midst of their own grief transformed a 12-year-old’s life.

This self-contained man discusses his condition and its treatment very matter-of-factly, but gets emotional when he recalls the significance of that decision, taken by strangers for a recipient they would never know. Shortly after Patrick received his kidney, he wrote to the donor family, via the Organ Donation Unit in Beaumont Hospital to express his gratitude. And he remains grateful. Every year on the anniversary of his transplant, he gets Masses said for the donor and the donor family, and sends cards to the family via Beaumont.

“As I get older, when I look back on it, it’s more significant, especially what I can do because of the transplant – work, education, travel, marriage, he says.”

He wasn’t aware, as a youngster, that he was so unwell.

“It was different for me than most people who suffer kidney failure because I had been born with the condition.”

So, Patrick just got on with his young life despite constant visits to hospital – he spent three months in Crumlin at one time, after a particularly bad episode during which Ennis A&E saved his life.  As an aside, he points out the necessity for A&E units in local hospitals – in his case it was the difference between life and death.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.