Photo by Jason Redmond

Ted Lombard of Ventura holds up a photo of his daughter Denice with the message, "Dearest Daddy, with love, Denice." Ted Gave Denice one of his kidneys 40 years ago.

Denice Lombard is 53. Her kidney will turn 79 in October. That's because, when Lombard was 13, her then-38-year-old dad saved her life by donating one of his kidneys.

"I've now had his kidney longer than he had it," Denice said.

On Thursday, Lombard and her dad, Ted Lombard of Ventura, celebrate the 40th anniversary of the transplant that saved her life.

"That's wonderful," said Dr. Gabriel Danovitch, director of the kidney transplantation program at UCLA Medical Center. "At 40 years, that's probably one of the longest-functioning (transplanted) kidneys in the country."

Denice lives in Washington, D.C., now, so Ted will travel to the East Coast to be with his daughter and his other kidney for the anniversary.

Ted, who shares Denice's blood type, donated his kidney to Denice in 1967 to save her from her twin's fate. Denice's twin, Diane, died in 1961 at age 7 from a congenital kidney disease that Denice also inherited.

"I don't care how many people are around you," said the twins' mother, Anne Lombard, 73. "It's still a lonely journey when you lose somebody you love."

Ted and Anne still are brought to tears over the ordeal that led up to the organ donation that has so far given Denice 40 more quality years of life.

"By all means, I'd do it again," Ted said, trying to steady his voice over tears.

Ted and Anne, who ended their 18-year marriage 36 years ago, remain good friends.

"We have a lot of kids in common and suffering in common," Ted said.

The parents, who also had four other children together, spoke about the transplant this week in Anne's Ventura living room.

Seated next to her father was their youngest daughter, Lelah Lombard, 41, of Ojai. A white cat curled up on the sofa back behind Lelah and a Jack Russell terrier mix lay on her back between Lelah and Jack, her four feet splayed in the air. On the hardwood floor, another white cat and a slipper-sized 19-year-old dog dozed in their pet beds.

Laid out on the coffee table was a scattering of family photos, including some of Denice, her face swollen from the steroids she had to take after the transplant. One frame contained a photo of Denice and Diane, born 11 months after Ted and Anne were married in 1953.

Anne had been 20 years old all of 10 days when Denice and Diane were born on May 20, 1954, near Monterey. Denice weighed 6 1/2 pounds; Diane weighed 5 pounds.

About a year after the twins were born, the family returned to Ventura.

From the beginning, the twins were sickly.

Ted was in the Army at the time, so Anne spent much of her time ferrying the girls back and forth to the hospital. They were eventually diagnosed with a rare condition called chronic glomerulonephritis, a progressive disease that meant irreversible renal failure. Ted, who had been sent to Korea, was called back to help care for the twins.

The family was growing, also. Two years after the twins, Theodore Jr. came along. Two years after that, Elizabeth. And when the twins were 6, David. Lelah would arrive seven years after David.

"She not only had these sick twins, but all these toddlers and infants," Denice said.

Losing Diane

Despite every effort available back in 1961, Diane was failing. In the end, she couldn't even stand up. All she could do was sit at the dining room table and make toast.

"She still wanted to contribute to the family. She wanted to make toast. So we ate a lot of toast," Anne said, the tears welling in her eyes.

Diane died on Nov. 24, 1961, at UCLA Medical Center.

"I grieved her death for many, many years," Denice said. "That's one of the biggest losses I've ever suffered. What would it be like to have an identical twin? It's something I so wish I could know."

From the beginning, the twins' UCLA-based pediatrician, Dr. Neil Litman, had been working to try to help the girls. In a Ventura Star-Free Press article that ran the day after her death, Litman said, "We have presented their case to many organizations and groups of medical men in hopes of learning something about the disease."

An extensive autopsy on Diane helped the medical professionals better understand what was going on with Denice, but a transplant was still not under consideration.

"There weren't many kidney transplants done back then," Danovitch confirmed, adding that, at the time, kidney transplants had about a 50-50 chance of succeeding.

"Litman said he could not involve himself in procedures that caused children suffering with little hope of success," Anne remembered.

Still, Anne kept knocking on doors. Litman — who died in June at 86 — finally was able to arrange an appointment for Denice with Dr. Robert Vernier, who was visiting the UCLA Medical Center from the University of Minnesota. Vernier had done extensive research into pediatric kidney disease and was considered a pioneer in the field.

To everyone's delight, he agreed to do a transplant. All family members were tested and Ted was determined as the best match. Ted said the decision was an easy one, even though his father was very concerned about the risk he was taking with this relatively new procedure.

"He said, You have all these other children and you put your life on the line,'" Ted recalled his father's words.

Denice remembers little about the operation, but does remember a moment of terror in the UCLA parking lot right before the surgery.

"I asked, Am I going to die?' and we had a good cry," she said.

Pretty in pink

After the transplant, the kidney began working immediately. One of Anne's fondest memories from Denice's bedside was Litman's remark at the pink-tinged urine collecting in a container from her new kidney. According to Anne, he said, "Isn't it beautiful!"

Denice said she felt better almost immediately. Before the transplant, she was just 4 feet, 4 inches tall. After the transplant, she grew to her current height of 4 feet, 11 inches.

Photo by Jason Redmond

It's "a lonely journey when you lose somebody you love," said Anne Lombard of Ventura, above.

"The moment I had my transplant, it was like, Plug me in, I'm ready to go!'" she said. "My skin transformed. I felt good. I felt I could do anything."

And she has. A Google search for "Denice Lombard" turns up more than 800 hits, the majority of them pertaining to her anti-war activism in Washington, D.C.

"She's probably the most active activist there is," Ted said.

"I feel a very constant and pressing sense of mortality," Denice said. "I always hate it when I waste time."

Denice grew up and moved to Northern California, then relocated to Washington in 2003 when her partner of 26 years, Nancy Wohlforth, got a job there. Denice works as a court reporter, while spending any free time she has fighting for her beliefs. She currently is serving as coordinator of the International Solidarity Task Force of U.S. Labor Against the War (USLAW). An active supporter of Democratic presidential hopeful Dennis Kucinich, she can even be seen on YouTube, standing at his shoulder, during a speech in late spring (see www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZTb3SLa_2VE).

Denice believes her activism is the result of being the oldest child as well as getting a second chance at life.

"I really want to do something with my life that's useful, which is why I feel I'm politically involved," she said. "I like to help those in need because my sister died. I'm the one that got lucky and got a second chance at life from my dad."

Just as they do most years, Denice and her dad plan to be together on Thursday. Ted will travel to D.C., where they will celebrate the day of her new beginning with gifts and just being together.

Her kidney, she says, is working well, enabling her to be physically active.

"I kayak for miles, ride bikes for miles, hike for miles," she said. "I love the out of doors. It's my church."

She knows her kidney is 25 years older than she is, but "I always assume mine will last forever," she said. "I don't worry about that."

Danovitch can't comment on Denice's specific case and stressed that each case is individual, but he said that transplanted kidneys usually last an average of 15 years.

The fact that it's functioning well after this long is promising, in his opinion. Theoretically, if Ted lives to be 100 with his kidney functioning well, the kidney he gave Denice could function well for decades more.

"God gave us two kidneys in case something like this happened," Ted said with a grin.

Anne said the entire experience of Diane's death and Denice's second chance at life has helped to form the family. In a way, she said, Diane's short life was a life well lived, because it was so meaningful to those around her.

"Some of the things I like most about myself are because I went through this," Anne said.