This North Texas matchmaker needed a kidney. Her match was there all along
A Keller couple is facing the true meaning of their vows to be with each other in sickness and in health.
Jennifer Hill-Gowans is facing a life-threatening illness. Her husband Kennus Gowans has stood by her side as her health deteriorated over the last few years.
The couple, who has been married for 26 years, said Jennifer started getting sick in 2020. After multiple doctors’ appointments and emergency room visits, she was diagnosed with stage five kidney failure.
“When I found out, it was devastating,” Jennifer said. “Especially because for me, it was a very fast-track process of how this all came about.”
Jennifer, who was a professional matchmaker, had to take a step back from her career and face the new reality of what she could do daily. After the diagnosis, the couple tapped into their nearly three decades of love and support for each other.
Another match
“I allowed myself a moment to process it,” Jennifer said about her diagnosis. “To be devastated about it, because it was devastating to me, and I had to figure out going forward: What is this going to look like for me 10 years down the road?”
Ultimately, Jennifer’s kidney deteriorated to the point of needing a transplant. The couple originally thought that Kennus might be a likely match because of his good health and active lifestyle, but a check-up revealed that his blood pressure was slightly elevated and was initially told by doctors he didn’t qualify.
The couple said it was heartbreaking to get that news from doctors, which opened the door to a new level of anxiety.
It wasn’t until this March, during a trip to Nashville for the American Kidney Fund conference, where they learned from other ambassadors and leaders that a match test is not a one-and-done situation. Kennus got re-tested.
Kennus, who had been working to improve his own health through more exercise and an even better diet, went through a rigorous, all-day physical exam that included a blood test, 24-hour urinalysis, heart tests, a CT scan and more.
Doctors found that Kennus’ antibodies were a match, and showed that there was less of a chance for Jennifer’s body to reject the new kidney. With the help of a microdose of blood pressure medication, he was approved by the hospital transplant board to be a living donor for Jennifer.
The matchmaker found her match, again.
Jennifer said finding out Kennus could give her a kidney was an incredible moment for the couple.
“We’re an extremely close couple and soul mates,” Jennifer said. “It’s kind of a joke in our family. People are like, ‘You guys are out here like the real life Adam and Eve, he is going to give you a piece of him to help you live.’”
Kennus said it brought tears to his eyes when he was able to tell his wife the good news: “It’s like the conclusion of a long painful process that you’ve had to watch your spouse go through.”
The couple set up a GoFundMe campaign to help with the cost of recovery and time off of work for the procedure. Their surgeries are tentatively for September 4.
Jennifer said while this wasn’t part of the plans they had made for their life, she made the decision to pivot and do what she can. She now is an ambassador for the American Kidney Fund and runs a Facebook page called Texas Cares Kidney Connection.
“I started educating myself and wanted to be an advocate for other people as well,” she said, adding that it’s important for people to go to routine check-ups because early detection can help increase the chances of a good outcome.
Jennifer said they have a great support system with Kennus’s son and two grandsons, friends and extended family and the couple’s dog, baby Charlie.
Her niece Raven Hill, who is a college film student, created a short documentary film about the couple.
‘The closer you are to your partner, the more you feel it’
Kennus said the part that most people don’t talk about with life-changing diagnoses is how spouses cope with unexpected news about their loved ones.
“The closer you are to your partner, the more you feel it,” Kennus said. “You can’t physically feel every single thing that they’re going through, but you experience it on a level because their highs and lows, you’re basically experiencing it together.”
Kennus said it’s hard to watch those highs and lows, and it can become mentally overwhelming.
He said the process of becoming a match was difficult, but was worth it for the joy he felt when the doctor told him he would be able to give his kidney to Jennifer.
“At the end of the day I get to be with this magnetic, instrumental person who played such a pivotal role in my life,” Kennus said. “It’s important that she never let having kidney disease break her. Has she cried? Yes. Has she been upset and frustrated? Most definitely. But she never let it break the true essence, of her core essence of who she is, she is still doing the things she’s always loved and done.”
Kennus said his advice for spouses, especially husbands who are in a similar situation, is that communication is very important during the good and bad days and their issues need to take a backseat to their wife’s condition.
“We let our foundation be our faith and our love and our respect for each other, because those are things that can’t be replaced,” Kennus said.