Hampton family seeks life-saving kidney donor for daughter: 'It just breaks your heart'

HAMPTON — The family of a Winnacunnet High School graduate is urgently seeking help to find a donor for their daughter’s much-needed kidney transplant.

The Kahigian family is campaigning to find a living kidney donor for their 29-year-old daughter, Jessica, whose recent rapid kidney failure has brought her to the brink of needing dialysis. This will be Jessica’s second transplant; her first, necessitated by a genetic kidney disease, occurred when she was a teenager.

Jessica, who now lives in Exeter, is getting by on more than a dozen medications to make up for her failing kidney and lives with constant fatigue. She said waiting on the organ donor list could take up to five years.

“Every time the phone rings, you think that you’re going to get a match, then it’s just a spam call,” Jessica said. “Just gets a little degrading sometimes.”

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Kidney disease shakes life of WHS soccer player

Jessica was born with polycystic kidney disease, though it didn’t manifest until she was in high school. She played soccer at Winnacunnet High School, where her father described her as an enthusiastic and hardworking player.

In her freshman year in 2010, Jessica began feeling sluggish on the soccer field. Her father, Mark Kahigian, recalled this was the moment he realized something was wrong.

“He said, ‘You love soccer, what’s going on?’” she recalled. “One outing on the soccer field I’d be amazing, one I’d be slow.”

The family did not realize her body was compensating for what was happening with her kidneys. When she went for some routine bloodwork her freshman year, she got a call back from the doctor's office saying that “something’s off.”

“My numbers were just not normal,” Jessica said.

Doctors told the Kahigians to immediately take her to Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center in Lebanon. There, she spent 24 hours undergoing different tests.

“That’s when the doctor told me my kidneys were failing,” she said. “They couldn’t reverse it.”

Finding a kidney donor took about a year. She received a donated kidney from a deceased person a week before having to start dialysis. The wait was shorter than most because Jessica was a juvenile, according to her mother, Diane.

The kidney transplant was a success, and although Jessica knew she might need another in the future, her doctors told her it could be many years before that became necessary. She studied business at Thomas College and now works for AW Chesterton, a company that manufactures industrial products.

Last August, Jessica was moving into a new townhouse in Exeter when she got another call from her doctor saying her kidney was again failing, and quickly. She had suffered two bouts of COVID-19 in the prior couple of years, leaving her with an infection that caused a vast decline in kidney function.

“Talk about horrible timing,” Jessica said. “I think I’m going to settle down, got everything squared away, and then basically, bam, I’ve got to get a new kidney.”

Jessica underwent a blood infusion that fall through a process her family described as similar to a cancer patient going through chemotherapy. The process only had a 33% success rate, they said, and Jessica was fortunate it worked.

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Family campaigns to help Jessica find a new kidney

Now, with high medical bills and draining fatigue, Jessica is waiting for another donor.

She is lower on the donor list, however, since she is no longer a juvenile. Those who were eligible to donate the first time she needed a kidney may no longer be eligible, either, according to her family.

Her father was a match when she was in high school but could not give his kidney because he had a history of kidney stones in the prior 10 years. He got tested to be his daughter’s donor this past year, only to find out Jessica’s antigens had now changed to match her current kidney. He was no longer a match.

Jessica said getting through the day is difficult. She works from home and often sleeps when she is not logged in to the computer. Her energy changes from moment to moment, sometimes going out with friends, but her body always compensates after with a need for rest.

“Right now, I’m feeling good,” Jessica said. “Could be in a few hours I’m down and out.”

Her family is bent on finding a match so she can get back to living her life. They said it has been devastating to watch her struggle as they desperately hope for a kidney to become available.

Her mother, Diane Kahigian, said watching her daughter suffer from kidney failure is more painful than living through her own battle with breast cancer.

“There’s nothing compared to seeing your daughter go through it,” she said. “It just breaks your heart.”

In the meantime, Jessica’s younger sister Christina has started a GoFundMe page to help cover the medical costs that continue to mount. The page has raised $1,650 with a goal of $50,000.

“She’s so strong,” Christina said of her sister, who she called her best friend. “She’s really in a lot of pain.”

The family says they have received great support from the local community. They hope they can spread the word through social media and other means. Those interested in checking their compatibility with Jessica can apply to be her donor online at Dartmouth-Hitchcock’s website .

“We have to hit this until someone says we have a match,” Diane Kahigian said.

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This article originally appeared on Portsmouth Herald: Hampton family seeks life-saving kidney donor for daughter: 'It just breaks your heart'