On August 10, 2015, the now 59-year-old Oamaru woman donated a kidney to someone ''close to me''.
And on February 17 this year, she completed the half ironman at Challenge Wanaka 2017.
Today is World Kidney Day, and this year's theme is Healthy Lifestyle for Healthy Kidneys.
Kidney Health New Zealand education manager Carmel Gregan-Ford said about 500 New Zealanders were waiting for a kidney transplant at any one time. There were 172 kidney transfers in 2016, 72 of which were from live donors, and kidneys from live donors ''usually do very well''.
The recipient of Mrs Browne's kidney asked not to be identified, but as soon as Mrs Browne heard a kidney was needed, ''I thought, 'I want to be her donor'.''
After six months of X-rays, a mammogram, a smear test, ''numerous'' urine tests and blood tests in Oamaru and Dunedin, she was ready.
''I was quite fearful going closer and closer to it [the surgery], knowing the things that could go wrong,'' she said. ''But . .. I would always get my mind back to what a benefit it was going to be for my recipient and how it was going to change her life.
''And it would take that fear away.''
Yet, when about a year later her daughter Sarah Browne suggested she joined her in Wanaka to race 113km - a 1.9km swim, 90km bike ride and 21.1km run - ''it was just the most ridiculous, and the most impossible, thing I could have imagined''.
But she had a plan, and she trained. Still, before the race she was ''terrified''.
''It was very emotional, very, very emotional; I was fighting back tears, majorly, anticipating it,'' she said.
But as soon as she started, ''all that training just 'happened' and I was fine''.
