LYNN – Lynn resident Nathaniel Mehu, 21, has been struggling with kidney failure for more than a year, and he is in search of a new kidney.
“Over time, it has been getting harder and harder, because I’m 21 and I had a pretty active life, and it stopped my football career,” said Mehu.
Mehu, who attended Harrington Middle School, KIPP Academy and KIPP Academy Collegiate in Lynn, graduated from Everett High School. He said sports had always been a huge part of his life, and he played for Everett’s basketball and football teams during his junior and senior years.
He then enrolled at Riverside City College in California, where he planned to advance his football career and his education in computer science, but it all came to an abrupt halt when he got a strange swelling in his legs that made them feel numb at times. Mehu had to come back to Massachusetts and his sister brought him to the hospital. He was diagnosed with stage 3 kidney failure.
“It was sudden, because no one in my family has it,” said Mehu.
After a week in the hospital, he was released home, but his condition rapidly deteriorated. When Mehu went back to the hospital, the practitioners discovered that he had already gone into end-stage kidney failure. That means his kidneys were no longer working as they should to meet his body’s needs. Patients at this stage typically need dialysis or a kidney transplant to stay alive.
“It was the fastest growth of the third- to end-stage that they’ve seen,” said Mehu.
He was put on hemodialysis, and later it was changed to peritoneal dialysis, and then back to hemodialysis, but of a different type. Since then, Mehu has also had three surgeries and he has to take 8-10 pills daily due to his condition.
He is currently on the waitlist for a new kidney, and according to him, getting it might take him 5-8 years. Mehu, whose blood type is A+, is hoping for a new kidney sooner than that.
Mehu said his sudden condition has negatively affected his life. He can’t play sports or go out with his friends, and he had to temporarily stop his education last year.
He still doesn’t understand the cause. The only reason the doctors gave him was that it might have happened because of COVID, “but I never had COVID,” said Mehu.
“I still to this day don’t have the definite reason as to how I got the kidney failure; no doctor has been able to pinpoint the reason,” said Mehu.
Oksana Kotkina can be reached at [email protected].
