Melissa Tuff

💚 Help Me Get a New Kidney 💚

My name is Melissa, and I am asking for your help with something I never imagined I would have to ask for again:

I need a kidney transplant to save my life.

At 16 years old, I was diagnosed with Rapidly Progressive Glomerulonephritis. Just two weeks later—on my 17th birthday—I began hemodialysis for end-stage kidney disease.

I spent nine and a half years on dialysis, enduring thousands of treatments while waiting for a transplant. Then, in 2005, I received the phone call that changed my life: they had a kidney had for me!

That incredible gift gave me nearly 11 years of freedom from dialysis.

But in 2009, I experienced a rejection episode that ultimately damaged my transplanted kidney. After years of trying to preserve it, I eventually lost the transplant and returned to dialysis.

Today, I am once again waiting for the gift that could give me my life back.

💚 I Do My Part Every Single Day

I don’t want anyone to think I am simply sitting back and asking others to rescue me.

I am fighting for my life every day.

I perform my own home hemodialysis four days a week, because dialysis is what keeps me alive while I wait.

I do gig work so that I can balance my life-sustaining treatments and my work schedule.

I volunteer my time with multiple kidney and transplant advocacy organizations.

I advocate for people living with kidney disease and those waiting for transplants.

I educate others about kidney disease and organ donation through my presence on social media and offer personal guidance to patients and their families via phone and private messages.

I continue showing up for other people—even while I am fighting one of the biggest battles of my own life.

But the truth is, I cannot work, advocate, volunteer, dialyze, and somehow carry the enormous financial burden of a transplant by myself.

I don’t have a large family network or a wealthy safety net waiting to catch me.

I am largely on my own.

The people who have stood beside me, encouraged me, prayed for me, shared my story, and helped me keep going are people I have met through social media and through the kidney and transplant communities.

In many ways, this community has become my family.

And right now, I am asking my community to help me make it to the other side of this journey.

💚 A Kidney Is Only the Beginning

Because of my history, my age, previous transplant, and extremely high level of antibodies, finding a compatible kidney is especially difficult.

I have had over 600 potential living donors tested for me along with one advanced donation where a wonderful individual I met through Facebook participated in a paired exchange in my honor resulting in me receiving sort of a rain check for a kidney from the National Kidney Registry. Throughout my search for a living donor I have also remained on the national transplant waiting list for a deceased donor. Unfortunately, I have already been waiting 16 years with no end in sight.

A transplant would give me the opportunity to finally step away from the machine that keeps me alive four days a week and return to a life that isn’t dictated by dialysis.

But getting to that transplant comes with enormous financial challenges.

Even now, Medicare only covers 80% of my dialysis costs, leaving me responsible for $1,300 or more every month just for dialysis-related expenses.

And once I receive a transplant, the financial burden doesn’t simply disappear.

I will have transplant-related deductibles, coinsurance, copays, medical appointments, travel, and lifelong medications. I will also need to take immunosuppressant medications for the rest of my life to help protect my new kidney.

My transplant center requires me to demonstrate significant financial resources before I can proceed with transplantation. I need to raise and maintain approximately $12,500 just to meet the financial requirements associated with my transplant eligibility.

And that’s only part of what I need.

💚 I Will Have to Stop Working to Recover

After transplant surgery, I will need to take time away from work to recover since my job includes lifting, navigating stairs and crowded, public areas all of which are restricted immediately following transplant.

That means I won’t just have medical bills to worry about.

I will also lose income while I heal.

I have to plan for the weeks when I won’t be able to work, while simultaneously preparing for the expenses that come with surgery, medications, follow-up care, transportation and food.

My transplant center also requires me to have a caregiver for approximately 4–6 weeks after surgery because of the frequency of follow-up appointments and the increased risk of rejection during those critical early weeks.

After major abdominal surgery, while recovering and taking medications that can affect my ability to drive, traveling that distance alone several times a week simply isn’t realistic.

I need to have someone with me during my recovery period to respond quickly if something goes wrong.

So I have to raise enough money not only to get the transplant—but to survive the weeks surrounding it.

💚 I’m Asking Because I Have No Other Choice

I wish I could tell you that I have everything I need.

I don’t.

I wish I could tell you that insurance will take care of it all.

It won’t.

I wish I could tell you that I have a large financial safety net.

I don’t.

What I do have is determination, faith, a willingness to work, a commitment to helping others, and an incredible community of people who have found their way into my life.

I’ve spent years fighting to stay alive.

I’ve spent years advocating for kidney patients.

I’ve spent years encouraging people to become living donors, register as organ donors, and understand what kidney disease really means.

And now I need people to stand with me.

I am desperate to raise the money necessary to complete this journey.

Every donation—whether it is $5, $25, $100, or more—brings me one step closer to having the financial resources I need when that life-changing phone call comes.

If you can’t donate, please share my story.

You never know who might see it.

You never know who might know a potential living donor.

You never know whose heart might be moved to help.

And you never know whether the person who sees your share might ultimately be the person who helps save my life.

💚 Please Help Me Reach My New Kidney

A stranger once gave me the greatest gift I have ever received: the opportunity to live without dialysis.

I am praying for the chance to experience that freedom again.

I want more time.

More birthdays.

More adventures.

More advocacy.

More laughter.

More time with the people—and cats—I love.

More opportunities to use everything I’ve learned through this journey to help someone else.

I don’t want dialysis to be the thing that defines the rest of my life.

I want a chance to live it.

If you are able, please make a donation to my transplant fundraiser today.

Your donation isn’t just helping pay a bill.

You are helping me prepare for a transplant.

You are helping me prepare to survive the recovery.

You are helping me prepare for the income I will lose while healing.

And ultimately, you are helping me prepare for the possibility of life beyond dialysis.

My fundraiser is being administered through Help Hope Live, a trusted nonprofit organization that has provided community-based fundraising support to people facing catastrophic medical expenses for more than 30 years.

Donations are held by Help Hope Live in the Southeast Kidney Transplant Fund and administered for transplant-related expenses in accordance with its program. Donations may be tax-deductible to the extent permitted by law.

Please click the DONATE NOW button and help me get one step closer to my new kidney.

If you can’t donate, please share this page. A share costs nothing, but it could put my story in front of the person who can make a life-changing difference.

Thank you for every donation.

Thank you for every share.

Thank you for every prayer, message, encouraging word, and act of kindness.

And thank you to the people I’ve met through this journey who have become my support system when I didn’t have one anywhere else.

I am still here.

I am still fighting.

And I am asking you to help me keep fighting.

With love, blessings, and immeasurable gratitude,

Melissa Tuff 💚