HIGHLANDS RANCH, Colo. (KDVR) — While most kids enjoyed sleeping in on this snow day, an 8-year-old from Highlands Ranch was up before the sun to make it to his dialysis appointment.
Forrest Holt is currently on the waitlist for a new kidney and he’s hoping you might be able to help. His mom asked the FOX31 Problem Solvers for help spreading the word.
In Colorado and Wyoming, there are nearly 2,000 people on the waiting list for life-saving organ transplants. Eighty-five percent of them are waiting for a kidney. Holt has been waiting his entire life.
“He just needs a normal life,” his mother Tonia Reynolds said. “He needs to wake up, eat breakfast, and go to school and not have to go to and from the hospital so many times a week.”
Forrest has been through a lot in his eight years. He spent the first 356 days of his life in five hospitals. He was born with a vascular malformation in his leg. When he was about 4 months old, he had a massive hemorrhage where he bled out for eight hours. That led to kidney failure, 80 surgeries and 300 blood transfusions. His mother has documented it all on Facebook, where Forrest has quite the following.
They are hoping to find a living donor to give him a new kidney. Forrest said he just wants to go to school to be with his friends.
“He’s been through a ton, but he has the most infectious smile, anywhere we go, whether it’s the grocery store, the park, meeting new people, even just walking through the hospital to get from appointment to appointment, people are just really drawn to him,” Reynolds said.
Time is of the essence, on average, a person can only live on dialysis for five to 10 years, and Forrest has already been on dialysis for eight years.
“If we could get a living donor, it would be huge,” Reynolds said. “I think it’s his time. It would mean everything to me. It’s been a long journey. I just want him to be able to run and play with the other kids.”
Even though they are looking for a match for Forrest, they also want to raise awareness about the need for living donors. You can see if you’re a match on the UCHealth site.
His full name and birthdate is Forrest Holt, his birthdate is June 19, 2013 and his blood type is B+. For more information on registering to become an organ, eye and tissue donor: www.DonateLifeColorado.org.