At 31, he was a newlywed whose lone kidney was failing fast — with no donor in sight. He'd been on a national kidney waiting list since he was 27.

In January 2003, Monsignor Michael Burke stepped to the pulpit at St. Maria Goretti Catholic Church on Flad Avenue and asked parishioners to consider giving Hurtgen a healthy kidney.

Karen Bredeson, then 46 and a new member of the parish, came forward. She barely knew Hurtgen, but on June 19, 2003, she donated one of her kidneys to him in a surgery at UW Hospital.

"By the time he had the transplant, he had only 9 percent use of his kidney," said Hurtgen's wife, Ali. "If the church hadn't come in, I don't know what would have happened. It could have been a disaster."

Five years later, life is good for both donor and recipient.

Erik "is doing fantastic," Ali Hurtgen said. "And Karen got married last year. Happiness came right to her door after (the transplant) all happened. She found what she had been searching for her whole life."

Erik Hurtgen, now 36, works at the Bruce Co., planting large trees and working 12 hours a day outside in the summer, she said. A few years after the operation, the couple bought a house in Middleton.

"He takes about 30 pills a day, but he leads a very normal life," Ali Hurtgen said. "We don't take anything for granted."

It's up to Hurtgen to stay hydrated, eat right and exercise, she said. Every month he has his blood drawn. "And annually, we go in and see all of the doctors," she said. "They love to see him."

Ali Hurtgen, who works as a manager for the UW Foundation, has herself been fighting multiple sclerosis for 10 years.

Karen Bredeson became Karen Mack when she married John Mack last October. "I went from having never been married and no kids to having a husband and two teenaged stepsons," she said.

She says she has experienced no negative effects from the organ donation. "I often tell people when they talk about the 'gift of life' that it is not just for the recipient — it's really for the donor, too.

"I don't know that I would have been ready for a man as wonderful as John before I became a donor. When you go through the donation process, not only do you have to do a lot of soul searching, but you have to really know yourself well.

"I really found the kind of person I was and the kind of person I wanted to be. It helped me clarify everything I wanted from life."

The Hurtgens attended Bredeson's wedding. "We keep in touch with the big aspects of each others' lives," said Karen Bredeson Mack. "I'm so thrilled Eric is doing so well."

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