Richmond woman gives kidney to ailing former boss

This year, Susan Preston gave Bruce Dodds a Christmas gift that is changing his life.

Preston donated a kidney to Dodds.

"Her gift means a normal life again," Dodds said.

The living donor kidney transplant surgery took place Dec. 7 at IU Health University Hospital in Indianapolis. Dodds and Preston, both Richmond residents, are well on the mend.

For the first time in three years, food tastes good again to Dodds. His fluid intake is no longer restricted and he is free from dialysis.

"It's pretty amazing for someone not related to our family to make that gift," said Dodds' daughter, Lara Dodds.

Preston's husband, Roger Preston, and her daughters, Jessica McMorrow and Elise Chadwick, were not surprised by Preston's generosity.

"Susan is a make-a-difference kind of person," Roger Preston said.

"I would say my mom was unswerving in her decision (to donate) from Day One," McMorrow said.

Preston feels the Christmas season is the perfect time to celebrate Dodds' renewed life.

"The greatest gift given to us was Jesus," she said. "It almost seemed minuscule (in comparison) to give a kidney. It just seemed so right."

Preston and Dodds became acquainted eight years ago when he became her boss at Earlham College, where she is an administrative assistant. They each have three children and became grandparents at about the same time.

They worked together for five years before Dodds was blindsided by kidney failure from polycystic kidney disease, a genetic disorder causing cysts. It is the most common life-threatening genetic disease, one that often lies dormant for years.

Dodds had been treated for cancer not long before the kidney failure and believes that was his trigger.

His life changed immediately.

The kidneys control about 80 to 85 percent of the body's operating systems, Dodds said. He couldn't work and had to have dialysis three days a week.

"It (dialysis) takes over your life," Dodds said.

Most people, he said, understand that dialysis cleanses the blood because the kidneys can no longer handle that function. What they don't realize, he said, is that dialysis also removes the excess fluid from the body because without working kidneys, urination is not possible.

Each dialysis treatment, Dodds said, is as hard on the body as running a marathon and that body is operating at just 30 percent of its normal energy level.

Roger Preston, who works at Reid Hospital, said there is a misconception that a person can handle dialysis indefinitely.

"It's a Band-Aid on a gaping wound," he said.

"We had no idea it was such a physical hardship," Susan Preston said.

The past three years have been an emotional roller coaster for Dodds and his family. Initially, Dodds' wife, Marilyn, was deemed a match as his kidney donor. But when doctors discovered she had kidney stones, she became ineligible. Dodds said his wife literally cried for two weeks.

Other family members sought to be a match, but they were discovered to have the genetic predisposition to polycystic kidney disease. Dodds was listed as a transplant candidate on state and national databases. He had one near match.

"It's been three years of trying circumstances," Lara Dodds said. "(My father) has gotten through it with great courage and great strength."