When I started this column in June, I was just coming to terms with the fact that I was in end stage renal failure for the second time in my life. I have to admit I had no idea that only three months later, my wife and I would be packing our bags for a stay at the Royal Free Hospital in Hampstead and major organ surgery for both of us would only be a few days away.

Things have been moving very quickly now that Rachel has been given the green light to be a donor. Dialysis has given me a very basic form of kidney function, and so now that my health has improved a little, the hospital is keen to perform the kidney transplant as soon as they can.

They plan to transplant one of Rachel's kidneys – her left one specifically – into me next week. We had our final briefing from Alison, the Royal Free's live donor transplant sister, yesterday.

From this Friday, she told me to start taking a huge dose of Tacrolimus, the main immune-suppressant drug and one of the most expensive ones permitted by NICE. The doctors want to use the "Tac" to batter my immune system to pieces with the aim of reducing the risk of my body rejecting Rachel's kidney as much as possible.

I will be going into hospital on Monday. They will dialyse me that afternoon and again on Tuesday to make sure my blood is in as good a shape as it can be for the op.

Rachel will be admitted on Tuesday. We will be allowed to have a last supper together on Tuesday night before this momentous act in both our lives happens on Wednesday morning. Alison's turn of phrase sounded ominous when she said "they would come" for her at around 8.30am to take her to theatre. I'm not sure why, but I thought of Nazi jackboots clattering up the stairs in the Warsaw Ghetto.

I will be allowed to see my wife one last time before she goes under the knife but I know that we will hardly be garrulous. Nervous as hell and cracking bad jokes in a pathetic bid to ease the tension, I would have thought.

What I won't be able to put into words in the coldness of that hospital ward is the unalloyed love I have for her. That she is making this huge sacrifice for me I find difficult to comprehend. I mean it really is beyond the call of duty, isn't it? It is an extraordinary act and I know that we will have a unique bond afterwards.

She is my hero. As is my brother, who went through the same thing for me eight years ago. I'm one hell of a lucky guy.

By the late morning Rachel's team should have removed the kidney that is destined to be transplanted into me. Meanwhile, I will have been wheeled into a neighbouring theatre on the third floor of the Free, anaesthetised and ready for surgery myself.

Rachel will be in the recovery ward by midday whereas I won't be back in my ward until early evening. When I had my first kidney transplant in 2002 I remember feeling completely back to normal, abdominal pain aside, within a few hours of the operation. All my various blood figures, which before the op had been either far too high or too low, returned to normal almost straight away.

If the same thing happens this time following a successful transplant it will be the nearest thing Rachel and I, atheists both, get to witnessing a miracle.

Thanks to everyone who has left a message of support. See you on the other side, as they say.

• If you would like to join the organ donor register, you can do so here: uktransplant.org.uk