(calm music)
- It just started with a normal stomach bug.
All of a sudden, instead of getting better,
she dramatically was getting worse.
We were urged to go to urgent care,
and they're like, "Go to Children's Hospital.
"We just wanna make sure you're in the best care."
They're like "we need to escort you to Children's Anschutz."
Beckett had kidney failure.
- You had a healthy two-year-old, really active,
off the charts with everything,
and then just a sick kid.
You feel helpless.
- You are told your child has kidney failure.
It's never gonna be what you thought was gonna happen
for your child,
but I think we try to normalize it, to say,
"This is the way we will help you function now.
"You're not doing this alone by any means."
- Dr. Hanna put a plan out for us
on the whiteboard of our hospital room.
In a time where you you don't know what the future holds,
it's nice to hold on to a little bit of control
and see that your doctors are really thoughtfully
mapping out your next steps.
We just felt taken care of the whole time.
- [Dad] I remember when we first heard that,
okay, kidney failure, our first thought is, transplant.
- Dr. Hannah explained to us
that the best thing they could do is save her kidney.
While we started that process,
they realized that she had two autoimmune diseases,
very rare, each of them so rare
that they've never seen
that combination in a two-year-old before.
It was about eight months from diagnosis to transplant.
- Hearing about the transplant was kind of a relief.
Hearing that news was like, "Okay, we're moving forward."
- For Beckett's case,
a living donor seemed like the best path.
I was a blood match,
but I was also with Beckett through thick and thin.
I was her security blanket.
And so my sister got tested,
and was perfect match, immediately.
She said, "It's so obvious to me
"that I should be the donor because she needs you,
"and I can give back to her in a different way."
- Her disease is something on the rare end of it,
and so there's a lot of preemptive work
that the nephrologists had to do
to get her ready for transplant.
Her transplant, from our standpoint, was pretty uneventful.
The nephrologists did such a good job preparing her
that it was easy for us.
- The hour after transplant, she was sitting up in bed,
which she hadn't sat up in bed for eight months.
- [Dad] It was an instantaneous change in her,
and it was it was a great feeling,
a great sight to see that.
- Beckett was a little reserved, for sure.
She had the trauma of being in the hospital
and being on dialysis.
After transplant, she has nothing but thrived.
She's an active, adventurous, sassy little girl,
and before transplant, there was none of that.
So it's been super awesome to see her grow and thrive.
- It was always told to us that
she got a transplant to live her life.
She should go swimming.
Does she wanna go horseback riding?
You know, do the things that she wants to do.
- My goal for her is to be who she's gonna be.
She's developing into a little kid
who's not distracted by being sick.
She's only four right now, but I'm like,
I don't want her to age out of Children's Hospital.
I don't wanna ever leave here.
The pharmacy is the best.
The lab is the best.
The Kidney Center is the best.
We've been every single location,
every single floor of the hospital,
and it's always worth it to come here first.
I don't think we could be at a better place.
- This whole experience was challenging
but has changed us all in a very positive way.
And the support from the Kidney Center,
they were incredible.
- I can't say thank you enough,
because literally, you saved our lives.
All of our lives.
(soft music)