What Caregiving Really Feels Like: Shanell and Emmitt’s Kidney Journey

Shanell and Emmitt

This story was inspired by a personal reflection shared by ReMend Caregiver Mentor Shanell, and is shared with her permission. Shanell is the caregiver and partner of ReMend Mentor Emmitt, who is currently navigating his kidney transplant journey. With her permission, we are honored to share part of their story and invite caregivers to know they are not alone.

Caregiving is often described with words like strength, love, patience, and devotion. All of that is true. But caregiving can also be exhausting, frightening, lonely, and emotionally overwhelming — especially when someone you love is living with ESRD.

ReMend Caregiver Mentor, Shanell recently shared a deeply moving reflection about her fiancé, Emmitt, who is also a ReMend Mentor. Emmitt has been on the kidney transplant list for four years, navigating dialysis, medications, labs, phone calls, hope, disappointment, and the constant uncertainty that comes with waiting for a life-changing transplant. Shanell described caregiving as “a constant state of waiting. Watching. Listening. Bracing yourself for the next thing.”

That description captures what many caregivers know too well. Kidney disease does not only affect the person diagnosed. It touches partners, spouses, parents, children, friends, and loved ones who are often carrying a quiet weight behind the scenes.

For Shanell and Emmitt, the journey has included moments of hope, including people stepping forward as potential donors. It has also included heartbreak, delays, and the emotional toll of watching kidney disease affect Emmitt’s body, mind, energy, and independence.

In her reflection, Shanell wrote honestly about the helplessness caregivers can feel:

“Because I can’t fix this. I can’t take it away from him. I can’t force his body to just hold on a little longer. All I can do… is stay.”

That is the heart of caregiving.

It is not always about having the perfect words or knowing what to do next. Sometimes caregiving means staying present. Holding a hand. Making the call. Sitting through the fear. Finding humor in the middle of stress. Taking one more step forward when the road feels impossible.

Shanell also shared something every caregiver deserves to hear: caregivers need care, too.

So often, caregivers become the steady voice, the organizer, the advocate, and the emotional anchor. They may be grieving, scared, tired, or overwhelmed, but still feel the pressure to keep everything together. Her words are a reminder that caregivers should not have to carry that weight alone.

At ReMend, we believe support should extend to the whole kidney community — patients, transplant recipients, living donors, caregivers, and families. Peer support matters because no one should have to navigate kidney disease feeling isolated or unseen.

To Shanell: thank you for your honesty, courage, and vulnerability.

To Emmitt: thank you for continuing to mentor, encourage, and show what resilience looks like.

And to every caregiver quietly holding things together while pretending you are fine: We see you. Your role matters. Your exhaustion is real. Your love is powerful. And you deserve support, too.

Shanell’s original reflection can be viewed on Facebook here, depending on privacy settings.

Caregivers Need Support, Too

If you are caring for someone with kidney disease, on dialysis, waiting for transplant, or recovering after transplant, you do not have to carry it alone.

ReMend offers caregiver mentor support for people who want to talk with someone who understands the emotional, practical, and everyday realities of caregiving. A ReMend Caregiver Mentor can offer encouragement, perspective, and peer support from lived experience.

This is not medical advice or counseling. It is a chance to connect with someone who understands what it feels like to support a loved one through kidney disease.

Interested in speaking with a ReMend Caregiver Mentor? Request a mentor here.