mj_xx

In the near future: for the next month, I will have to watch my fat intake as my gall bladder has been removed in the surgery and the bile produced by the liver cannot yet deal with a lot of fat digestion. As for alcohol, I am advised to not drink anything for the next three months. I also have to eat in smaller portions/multiple portions because if my stomach is filled too much, it pressures the inside of the incision.

In the long run: my liver will actually grow back to 98% of its original size, as will the part I donated in my recipients body. This will happen over the course of roughly two months. My liver will learn to produce enough bile to deal with the occasional onion rings and fries, just as before. It will also be able to handle alcohol fine. They do want you to wait three months with the drinking to make sure everything is fine and they also advise you to quit alcohol/cigs/drugs completely but the liver can definitely take the occasional celebration.
So in the long run, neither my diet nor my alcohol intake should be impacted. :)

Unfortunately, no - I‘m not telling you this. You are only really able to donate part of liver once. This is due to your liver consisting of two lobes. The right lobe accounts for roughly 65% of your livers volume. The left lobe makes up around 35% of your livers volume.

They usually always taking the complete right lobe when you donate. It will never regenerate, but what will happen instead is that your left liver lobe starts growing, slowly filling in the void left by your right lobe.

After recovery you are basically left with one big liver lobe, that was formerly your smaller, left lobe.

If they were to take away from that lobe again, it would unfortunately not regenerate.

Therefor, you can only really donate once.

It does! Made in Germany and U.S. approved, haha!

That‘s so great to hear! I‘m sure you‘re looking forward to his visit and thank you for welcoming so many foreign exchange students into your home. It‘s a great service to cultural exchange and international experience!

I came back to Pittsburgh two times since I stayed here and they came to Germany once. I also met up with them in San Francisco and in Copenhagen once. :)

Thanks for your good wishes, we‘re trying hard, haha!

It certainly was wonderful, a once in a lifetime experience that I‘ll be forever grateful for! Prepare for a wall of text, haha!

Let‘s see - generally they supported and drove me to any sport/activity I wanted to do and even came out to see me and my school‘s soccer team in a tournament which was a 2 and a half hour drive away. This was like 3 weeks after I got there. The also encouraged me asking about everything I found interesting and tried to explain as best as they could. If I wanted to go somewhere they tried to make it possible and we visited lots of cool places. They would also take with them wherever they went and kind of expected me to at least try and find it interesting/enjoyable, which can be hard to do with a 16yo, haha. They were insistent on it though, didn‘t let me wiggle out and also made help out wherever I could. Mowing the lawn, painting the porch, helping fix one of their dads house. I think they saw that I really tried to throw my weight in to help out, to be interested and they appreciated it.

Best memories are probably carving pumpkins with them, them taking me to a Penguins game on my birthday, us going to Baltimore and a lot of different food festivals.

It‘s just too much to put down really, but they really helped shape the man I am today and I would do it all again, the exact same way with them. I 110% consider them family and if I ever marry, they‘ll sit with my other bio family.

Sounds like and fairy tale, certainly felt like one and I still don‘t how on earth I earned all that. :)