TONAWANDA, N.Y. — When 54-year-old Tanya Guralny of Tonawanda isn't working, the last place you'll find her is somewhere outside Western New York.
"You can't miss a dialysis treatment, so you can't travel, or you have to make arrangements wherever you're going for vacation," Guralny said. "I can't remember the last time I have taken a vacation."
When Guralny was 11, she was diagnosed with diabetes. She eventually found an insulin that worked for her, but it did its damage to both her kidneys.
Guralny was placed on the transplant list for a cadaver kidney and pancreas, which she eventually got over at the Cleveland Clinic in 2002.
However, now she's back on the kidney transplant list.
"They told me I could live up to 15 years with a cadaver kidney. Since I'm going into my 20th year now, I've managed to exceed that target," Guralny said.
This time she will need a living donor because the kidney could last from 25 to 40 years. She's had no luck since the search began in 2018, until a friend made a suggestion.
"My friend was driving home from work from downtown, and she was like, how about a billboard?" Guralny said. "I've never heard of it before but might as well try it. Try anything."
Back in August, Lamar Advertising got Guralny's phone call, and just the right person picked up.
"Every few months, she's on a different route. So she's been on the 33, she's been on the 190 in Niagara Falls, the 190 right behind me. So it creates the illusion she has a bunch of different billboards, but it's just the same board we're moving around from location to location," said Kristin Calorico, an account executive at Lamar.
Not only did Calorico help Guralny design a billboard, but she also started a fundraiser for her new friend.
"She is the sweetest soul. She touched my heart, and I just wanted to help her as much as I could," Calorico said. "I'm so hopeful for her and I think, I feel she will find her match, and she will get her happy ending."
Guralny has received many calls from drivers but is still waiting for just the right person to take notice.
Even if Western New Yorkers can't give Guralny her happy ending, there's still someone out there who needs this part of their story to close.
"There's so many of us who need a lifesaving transplant," Guralny said. "If you don't match me, maybe you'll match somebody else."
Guralny says Lamar even put up her billboard in Cleveland for a few weeks.
For anyone who would like to see if you can be her donor, you must have a perfect bill of health and A or O blood types.
You can register with the Cleveland Clinic here. Just type in "Tanya Guralny" for the questionnaire, and ignore the questions about Social Security.
No one with high blood pressure can be a kidney donor.
In New York State, anyone 16 and older can sign up to be on the NYS Donate Life Registry.
According to the state, more than 7 million people across the state have signed up for that.