The Women of Inspiration™ Podcast is hosted by Monica Kretschmer, CEO, of the Universal Womens Network™. Monica interviews inspiring female entrepreneurs and business leaders from diverse industries who lead, inspire, and motivate. Learn from women who share their career journeys, the path to success, and leadership wisdom in business and life.
In this episode of the Women of Inspiration™ Podcast, we speak with Cristina Howorun is an award-winning investigative journalist and documentary producer with CityTV in Toronto.
In 2018, Cristina went from being live, on-air, to near death on an IV. See the Kidney Living Donor Link below to donate.
Diagnosed with end stage kidney disease after routine blood work, and after a few frantic voicemails from her doctor urging her to go to ER, Cristina and her camera man rushed to a nearby hospital. She had 8 percent kidney function. The diagnosis was grim- she needed to start dialysis and pray for a transplant. She didn't miss a beat- and did peritoneal dialysis at home everyday for 9-11 hours, coming home from her newscasting job and plugging in. every night. Outside of work, her life was focused on staying alive. But her cousin Christine was a living angel- the mother of five, selflessly courageous donated one her kidneys to Cristina in June 2019. Both were thriving. She spent the next five years doing investigative journalism and producing, writing and hosting eight documentaries for CityTV- examining issues as broad as the true source of crime guns ("The Gun Chase"), sex trafficking in the suburbs ("Fighting Traffick") and exploring motherhood from behind bars ("Prison Moms"), the latter two earning awards. Cristina tried to seize every day and devoted her time to making meaningful connections, travelling, really engaging with friends and family and trying to make the world just a little bit better. She joined a board of directosr for a group that works hard to end intimate partner violence and sex trafficking and used her platform to continue to advocate for organ donation, and acts as an ambassador for the Kidney Foundation- never knowing she would need their help again.
But she does.
In 2024 doctors determined that her new kidney had failed- their best diagnosis is that when she contracted COVID a few years earlier , it ate away at the vulnerable organ. She was gutted. She started doing hemodialysis at home (a much more involved and difficult dialysis) so that she could continue to work- and she has. She's since produced and hosted several specials for CItyTV and even directed her first documentary "Debt to Society", while undergoing dialysis- travelling back and forth from Alberta and Ontario to do so, no small feat. But she needs another transplant- and after several potential donors were ruled out- she had to go public. The wait time for a deceased donor can be 7-10 years- and the odds are, her clock will run out before then.
Learn more about Cristina Howorun IG - https://instagram.com/howorun
Website - https://toronto.citynews.ca/author/cristina-howorun/Learn More: www.universalwomensnetwork.com
