The 27-year-old actress tweeted Monday that she hopes her circumstance spreads awareness for organ donation and support for the chronically ill.<\/b>
\nLOS ANGELES \u2014 \u201cModern Family\u201d star Sarah Hyland says she had a second kidney transplant last year, replacing a kidney from her father with another from her brother.
Hyland detailed her lifelong health struggles in an interview in Self magazine, and tweeted Monday that she hopes it \u201cspreads awareness of organ donation\u201d and \u201cbrings a sense of support\u201d to the \u201cbeautiful warriors\u201d in the chronically ill community.
The 28-year old, who has appeared on the ABC sitcom \u201cModern Family\u201d since she was 18, was born with kidney dysplasia, which causes cysts to grow on underdeveloped kidneys.
She received her father\u2019s kidney in 2012, but four years later her body began rejecting it, and she underwent a series of treatments that included months of dialysis that she squeezed in around \u201cModern Family\u201d shoots, but it became increasingly clear that the kidney would have to be replaced.
\u201cWhen a family member gives you a second chance at life, and it fails, it almost feels like it\u2019s your fault,\u201d Hyland said. \u201cIt\u2019s not. But it does.\u201d
The family learned Hyland\u2019s younger brother Ian was a match. She was reticent to take another organ from a loved one. He insisted.
\u201cI only cared about Sarah knowing that I had her back and that she was going to be OK,\u201d 23-year-old Ian Hyland told Self. \u201cI probably would have insisted on donating even if I wasn\u2019t a match.\u201d
Hyland had the second transplant in September of 2017, and is struggling to adjust to her changed body, but overall is recovering well.<\/p>\n