In December of last year Cheyenne had influenza A and was in the hospital for 8 days. This was the first time she had ever been in the hospital. Her hemoglobin got so low that she had to have a blood transfusion. While she was in the hospital we found out that she had lost a great deal of her kidney function. She was now down to just 20-25% function left. In January we started making arrangements for her to either go on dialysis, if we couldn't find a living donor, or have a transplant if we could find one. Four of us went to be cross matched and four of us were suitable donors. I was the closest matched because I'm her mother. Her grand mother and aunt were also matches. And then there was my husband, Cheyenne's stepfather who was also a match. It was very important to him to be able to do this for her, so we decided he would be the donor. We set the transplant for May 31st and went
about going through all the testing to prepare. And we hoped her kidney's
would hold out until then.
    On April 6th I received a call from Cheyenne's doctor telling us that her kidney's had failed. They were moving the transplant up to April 26th. We packed up the family and drove her 150 miles to the University hospital inn Omaha, Nebraska. She was admitted that evening to the hospital and was taken into to surgery the next morning to have a chest catheter put in to begin hemodialysis. They started dialysis that same day. Cheyenne was released 3 days later and we were able to go home. They set us up to do dialysis every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. We drove up on April 12th and April 14th. On the 14th after dialysis was over Cheyenne complained of not feeling well. I
wasn't aware enough to know that this was a sign. We went ahead and drove home that day, it was a Friday. Cheyenne woke me up 3 or 4 times during the night saying she was having nightmares, which is not like her at all. When we woke her up to do her morning meds she was burning up. We took her temperature and found it to be 105.6 degrees. We took her to the emergency room within a half an hour and her temp was already up to 107.1 degrees. She was once again admitted to the hospital. She was in our local hospital for 3 days. She had to have a spinal tap done. They transported her by ambulance to Omaha, where she was a patient for 3 more days. They found that her dialysis line had become infected with a staff infection. She was put on antibiotic for 14 days and the transplant was rescheduled for May 31st, the original date.
    As I write this update we are less than 1 week away from the transplant. I promise to have Lee put in another update after the surgeries.

Please Click Here to Read A Letter to the Editor that Chey's Mom Wrote

Because of everything that has gone on it has put this young family in financial bind. If you would like to help out please send donations to

Donations can be sent to:
Home Federal Bank
In care of: Patsy
221 S. Locust St.
Grand Island, NE 68801

Please enclose a note stating, "This is a donation for Cheyenne Cooper to be deposited in the 'Benefit Account' under Pat Cooper."