Medical scare reshapes Pasadena teen's future, perspective on life
PASADENA, Md. – Krista Jacobs, a 16-year-old from Pasadena, has had a new kidney for nearly three months.
"It's mine," Jacobs joked. "It's not my tissue. But, it's mine."
WJZ featured Jacobs this summer as she was awaiting a kidney transplant. Over the winter, she had been diagnosed with renal failure and needed a new kidney. Her dad, Mike, put the word out on social media and in the community.
"You know when you have a feeling something could happen—it's a weird feeling, you just kinda know?" Stacy McDonough said. "I can't imagine if I was in a position where I couldn't help my daughter or son or whoever in my family and I was given an opportunity."
McDonough saw Mike's Facebook post and was among the dozens of people to get tested to be a donor.
"There's been some people who have tried to talk me out of it—a few," McDonough said. "And, I just shook my head and said, 'You just don't get it.'"
McDonough donated her kidney to Jacobs on August 8 at the University of Maryland Medical Center. The surgery lasted about three hours and involved four surgeons, hospital officials explained.
"It's a very generous thing to do to someone, to just give up an organ, a whole organ, that has lived with you your entire life," Jacobs said this month at a cookout her family hosted for the McDonoughs. "I was thinking about this. It's kind of like being married into the family, expect organ...marriage...kind of."
Jacobs no longer needs to go to dialysis, where she had to go for treatment three times a week pre-transplant. She has reacted well to the new kidney, she said.
Jacobs' parents, Mike and Becky, say McDonough and her family feel like an extension of their family now. Before the transplant, McDonough had not met Jacobs, even though she is a parent in Jacobs' softball league.
"I'm just glad I can give this girl an opportunity to be a kid again, honestly," McDonough said. "I just hope she can live just a somewhat normal life. She deserves that."
Jacobs hopes to play softball again in the spring. She'll start off in the outfield instead of catching to limit contact though.
Jacobs said she has matured a lot during the medical scare.
"You know how when you're on safe ground and you're like, 'Oh. I could go on that roller coaster.' But, then, once you're on the roller coaster, you're like, 'Oh. I don't want to go on that roller coaster.'? I feel like it's like that," Jacobs joked. "I'm totally ready for anything the world throws at me now. I'm totally ready to face it because I went through something I never thought I would face."