Around the age of 18, Mart noticed that he occasionally had headaches. That did not surprise him: he studied in Groningen and had “the associated lifestyle”: often in the pub and little healthy food. “At one point I noticed that I couldn’t read the subtitles on TV properly. When I went to the optician, he was shocked: he saw a lot of damage in my eye and immediately sent me to the hospital.”
The doctors feared that he would suffer an infarction on the spot, he had to stay immediately. His kidney function appeared to be severely impaired. “Your kidneys purify your blood of waste products, which you eventually pee out again. If your kidneys don’t work properly, your blood slowly becomes poisoned. It can take a long time, but eventually other systems in your body also fail.”
A period of dialysis followed: three times a week he had to use the dialysis machine for four hours. “It was quite an attack on your life, I had to temporarily stop my studies. And you can’t go on dialysis for the rest of your life. You run the risk of infections and have to take medicines that also have all kinds of side effects. Sooner or later you had to so get a new kidney.”