The critical first three-month period has passed and Troy Darrell's new kidney is working just fine.

Transplanted from his sister, RoseMarie Lightbourne, in a hospital in Birmingham, England on August 4, the kidney began working right away and so far there have been no complications as 34-year-old Darrell continues to live a normal, hectic life, doing the things he has always done.

Gone are the necessary three-times-a-week visit to the Dialysis Unit to have his blood cleaned of toxins for three hours each day, Darrell now only drops in occasionally to see the nurses and the patients he got to know there.

"I stop by after I go and get my blood work done," explained Darrell. "Since I've been back I've been down there about four times. I go down there and see everybody."

Travelling will also now not be an inconvenience for Darrell who previously had to arrange for dialysis visits at hospitals in places he was visiting.

"Out of all the things that have happened, that's the only thing I can do freely," said Darrell who loves travelling.

"I'm doing everything I did before I left, I just don't have to worry about dialysis. On dialysis a lot of people stop doing a lot of things, but I kept doing everything I would normally do.

"That's why a lot of people didn't realise I was sick, because I kept bowling, played golf, still rode my horse and stuff like that."

Darrell was in England for two-and-a-half months while receiving his second kidney transplant and in between his release from hospital and his return home he managed to get in several rounds of golf. The first kidney he received a few years ago was rejected by his body after about a year and eventually forced him back on dialysis.

That kidney was from someone who had died, but the chances of a successful transplant are known to be greater when one is donated by a living person.

"It started working from the time they put it in," said a pleased Darrell.

"So it has passed one of the critical points, the first three months."

Darrell explained that over time his Doctor's visits will decrease as his health improves. He will always be on medication though the dosage will decrease over time.

"Every two weeks I'll get my blood work done and if I feel anything I'll call him, but otherwise it is a longer and longer period of time in between check-ups,' he explained. The blood work helps determine how well the kidney is functioning.

"The medication keeps your immune system down, because the kidney is not mine so the body naturally fights off anything that doesn't belong to you. I'll have to take the medication for the rest of my life, two main ones."

Darrell and his sister checked into the Priory Hospital in Birmingham at the same time and their operations were performed one after the other as the kidney was taken from his sister and then transplanted.

Mrs. Lightbourne went home after six days while her brother stayed in for ten days. "Out there you have to be there at least ten days before they let you out, nine days before they take out the stitches," Darrell explained.

"Mine was about a two-hour operation while hers was a little bit longer because they had to take one of her ribs out.

"Their operation is shorter, from what I hear, than the ones in Boston, where it is about four hours.

"It was a small hospital and her room was right across from mine. I'm very thankful to her, if it was me I would have done it, too."

The transplant was covered by some British newspapers and a television station, no doubt because Darrell's sister is the wife of a certain well-known Bermudian footballer, but it was also reportedly the first time the Birmingham transplant team had treated a patient who had come from abroad specifically to receive a kidney from a UK family member.

"They have so many people who need kidneys and people are passing away and not donating their organs," said Darrell regretfully.

"They just can't take somebody's kidney and give it to somebody unless they consent to it. The donor list is so short compared to the number of people waiting for them.

"They did the story to try to promote people giving kidneys. They noticed in statistics that people giving a kidney are living longer lives and are trying to alleviate people's fears, that it is not as dangerous as they think it is."

In a Lifestyle article in June, Mrs. Lightbourne revealed that she had been considering giving her brother a kidney for about five years. A series of tests had to be done to determine if she was a good match.

"In February 1996 I came home and we went to Boston to check out whether I would be compatible to give him a kidney," explained Mrs. Lightbourne months ago.

"My dad went as well to see if he was compatible and we just did blood tests. But the tests I did this time around were far more extensive to what we did in Boston. In England they did so much more.

"They took his blood and sent it to England and what they did was a cross match which is taking his blood and my blood and mixing it together. If they do that you can be either a negative match or positive match and in cross blood mixing you want to be a negative match which means there is no reaction when they mix your blood.

"If there was a reaction when they mixed our blood I don't think he would have been able to have a kidney from me. You can be anywhere from zero to a 100 percent match and we were a 50 percent match which is common in siblings, though you can be higher."

Looking back on the events of August, she considered it a natural act to help her brother and is hoping she can encourage others to do the same thing.

"The operations were first thing Saturday morning and overlapped a bit, and once they got my kidney out and cleaned it out they had already started on him and inserted it in him," explained Mrs. Lightbourne.

"By Saturday night he produced three litres of urine already so they were quite pleased."

Mrs. Lightbourne had lots of time to mentally prepare for the transplant and had no second thoughts about going ahead with it.

"I was fine all in the lead up and thought when my brother came that I would get nervous then, but I wasn't nervous and was really surprised," she recalled.

"I checked into the hospital on the Friday night and when Kyle and the girls left and I waved to them from the window I felt a bit nervous."

Mrs. Lightbourne has spoken to the newspapers about her experience and will soon be interviewed by a women's magazine for a similar article.

"When the people at the hospital asked if we would speak to people about it, I said yes without hesitation because I thought they were going to have me speak to someone who was thinking about doing it, and I was going to left them know they can still have a regular life afterwards," she stated.

"But I didn't think it was going to be in the newspaper and on the news. When they sent the TV people around it was a bit close to home. People started calling and calling and some lady from a women's magazine has been in touch and they're supposed to be doing an article after women's issues and they thought this was interesting.

"She called Kyle's club and said she'd seen it in a Bristol paper and then somebody else called the club and said it was in a Stoke paper."

Added Mrs. Lightbourne: "I look at it like this, if it helps somebody to think `oh, this person has done it and they've got a normal, active life afterward then I would be in anybody's paper because it's an issue that needs to be addressed."

Her life has returned to normal in England, with no side effects. "The hardest part to me is not still thinking it is your kidney," said Mrs. Lightbourne who is in regular contact with her brother.

"And the doctor said, `oh, yes we did remove one of your ribs'. But I knew beforehand that if a rib got in the way they used to break it, but they removed one of them so I'm less a rib."