Spring break conjures up wild images of college students lounging on hot, sunny beaches and kicking up their heels in run-down bars. It's a chance to let go, have a good time, and try not to regret anything by the end of the week. It's a milestone in many a student's career and one that you remember with utmost fondness later in life. Unfortunately, spring break of my junior year had none of these vicarious attributes. It was March 1981, and I spent the early evening with my roommate mowing the front lawn of our house in Davis. Exhausted from a very difficult quarter, coupled by the sultry heat of the day, I called it an early night and went to bed. The milestone of my spring break occurred the following morning when I awoke to find my feet swollen, so swollen that I couldn't put shoes on, and that wasn't all. My legs and face were also swollen. At first, I thought I was having an allergic reaction to cutting the grass. One thing is true about Davis; they say if you have an allergy, it will show up in Davis. I wrote off the swelling to a freak allergy and looked to the next several days to bring relief. A doctor at Cowell Health Center seemed to agree with my self-diagnosis and put me on diazide, a mild diuretic. Sadly, after three weeks on diazide I had gained twenty pounds and realized that my diagnosis needed a little tweaking. I went back to Cowell Health Center, and by chance, a doctor overheard me telling the nurse my symptoms. He rushed me to his office, and in a matter of minutes we had a pretty good idea what was wrong with me. My kidneys were failing.

The first hope of any doctor treating a patient with my symptoms is to start a course of prednisone -- PREDNISONE! Not what you want to tell a woman who just gained twenty pounds! Unfortunately, that charming therapy failed, but I had managed to gain a few more pounds! Several months later, an open biopsy gave my illness a name: Membranous Proliferative Glomerulonephritis. Glomerulonephritis is sometimes an auto-immune disease and infectious agents, such as strep, are well-known causes of Glomerulonephritis. However, the doctors were unable to determine the cause of my Glomerulonephritis. Once I learned how to pronounce my disease, I had to learn how to deal with it. I stayed in college, switched majors, tried to eat a low-sodium, low protein diet, and attempted to distract myself as best I could. No distraction really works when you have to look in the mirror everyday and see the "new" you, and it's nobody you thought you'd ever become. The girl who ran A.A.U. track when she was a teenager and held city, county, and national titles was now a bloated, miserable woman of 22 who was so weak she couldn't lift twenty-pound weights if she tried, let alone run around a track. I knew I had to do something to change my life. School was enriching my mind, but I needed something more. I needed physical therapy. I needed to break the chains of guilt, grief, disbelief, and outrage. You really cannot know who you are until you are put up against something you feel you cannot control, you cannot fight. That's how I felt about my disease. It was invisible, but it left a tragic image of humanity in its wake. I had given up hope, but mostly, I had simply given up.

I found myself going back to the things I loved. Through painfully slow, progressive physical conditioning, I started to feel my body responding to the stimuli. Ever so slowly I built up my strength lifting weights and walking, and then gradually, step by step, I tried to increase my exercise. By the following year, I was backpacking, scuba diving, riding dressage and running. I was starting to feel like I had found a piece of me hiding within the empty shell of my disease. I was no longer consumed by what I couldn't do. I had found my way to cope and take control.

I continued to get stronger, and in 1984, I married Hal and had two lovely daughters, all while battling kidney disease. In 1992, a routine blood test confirmed that I had End Stage Renal Disease. Within four months my creatinine was over 12, and I needed a transplant to survive. Fortunately, my brother was a match, and in April 1993, I received my brother's kidney.

I remember my father always used to say, "The good Lord works in mysterious ways." Indeed, he does. I have learned from this wild journey that while "it weren't no spring break," it certainly had all the trappings. Throughout my journey, I have followed my heart, connected with what I love, and cherished these memories. I offer everyone these wishes, for with them there is hope, and with hope there are dreams, and with dreams you can become anything. Live strong, fight hard, don't give up, but most important, accept a change of direction! I took a right turn at spring break, and it has made all the difference.