While many people are hoping for new toys or gadgets for Christmas, the Brighams are hoping for a kidney. "It's a pretty life changing event, so at that point in time you're just trying to figure out okay what am I going to do next," Joan Brigham said.

John Brigham has been waiting for a match for two years and his wife Joan decided she needed to do something to help find a donor quicker.

Joan had a sign made for the back of their car that says, 'Your donation of a kidney will save my husband's life.' John and Joan found out his kidneys were failing about four years ago.

John has high blood pressure and type 2 diabetes. Even though he keeps his diet under close watch, takes his medicine properly and goes to dialysis three times a week, it's not enough to keep his kidneys functioning well. He now has to avoid foods he once considered healthy, like tomatoes, bananas and beans, because they worsen his condition.

"We never knew that a kidney issue could be the result of the high blood pressure or the diabetes; it wasn't something we were cognoscente of," Joan said.

While John's treatments are helping, they only help for a short time. Because of that John must go to dialysis three times a week, every week, for a total of 12 hours. "What's happening there is since your kidneys are not doing their job, they're not cleaning the poisons out of your blood, so now those poisons are continuing to circulate throughout the body," Joan said.

Because of that, they're hoping to find a donor who matches John's needs soon. Joan says the sign has gotten a huge response so far, but they're still waiting for a match. "It has definitely resulted in people reaching out to us," Joan said, "people have stopped me in the parking lot of CVS or one occasion we were at a stop sign and a lady walked around and tapped on my window and wanted to ask me a couple questions."

Joan and John Brigham on their wedding day.
Joan and John Brigham on their wedding day.  

Finding a match can be tricky because even when people say they want to get tested and donate their kidney to John, it doesn't always work out. Sometimes people have health conditions of their own that they were unaware of, or they're not a close enough match.

To be a living donor, you must be between 18 and 69, be in general good health and have an unselfish desire to help somebody else, according to UPMC. Costs for donating a kidney are covered by the recipient's insurance and recovery typically takes just two weeks. For more information on becoming a donor, click here.

Joan and John are hoping that more people will register to be living donors after seeing their sign so John and others like him in our area can be with their loved ones for more years to come.

For people hoping to be John's match, the couple set up an email account to reach them at kidney.John.E@gmail.com. To register to become a donor, go to livingdonorreg.upmc.com where you can start the process.