Life is a struggle, we are running a marathon that we have to win

Biljana donated a kidney to her son: Life is a struggle, we are running a marathon that we have to win

My husband, Dragiša’s father, was a kidney and heart patient. I planned to donate a kidney to him, but he died of heart problems at the age of 45 and left me a bequest to keep his kidney for Dragiša, because he had been treated since he was three years old at the Institute for Mother and Child. Already at such an early age, he was diagnosed with a kidney problem, although the doctors told us that dialysis would come much later or that there might not be a need for dialysis at all.

Biljana Petković’s confession

We controlled the disease until the corona, which accelerated everything. Dragisa was 26 years old at the time. He got a corona, which immediately descended on the weakest organ, in Dragiša’s case, it was the kidney. Up to that point, my son had led the life of a healthy young man, we had the disease under control.

At that moment, Dragiša’s serious battle with the disease began.

First, we did dialysis at home, every 4 hours, during the night. As a parent, I followed all of this, they even trained me to swaddle my son.

Along with those forms of dialysis, we also struggled with the pain Dragiša had in his stomach.

Because of those pains, we spent a lot of time in the Emergency Center. In the end, they kept Dragiša in the hospital for six months, and we still couldn’t discover the cause of those pains. My son was admitted to the hospital at the end of 2021, and he stayed until May 2022. He was discharged weighing 30 kg, he literally weighed 35 kg when he left the hospital.

During his stay in the hospital, those six months, I prepared everything for going to Turkey, for a transplant. We raised money through the organizations “Be Humane” and “Start Life”. Both of my sons played folklore, so cultural and artistic societies were also involved, there were concerts, parties, and my company was also involved. My son didn’t even get to be on the list in Serbia, we were forced to find a solution on the other side.

At that moment, the whole world is under the corona virus epidemic. Doctors in our country were diverted to covid centers, the teams that did transplants were broken up all over Serbia, there were no surgeries. I realized that I was losing my child in Serbia and that the only salvation and solution was to go to Turkey.

In such weather, we are leaving for a hospital in Turkey. The biggest problem was the excruciating pain that Dragiša had all the time. We didn’t know what was waiting for us and so we headed to Turkey. Today, from this point, we interpret all that as a great fear that my son felt, because he was aware that his father died after only two and a half years from the start of dialysis. He lived in fear that death was somewhere. Today, when he talks about it, he thinks that it was some excessive fear that occupied his head, and that pressure created in his stomach.

On July 18, 2022, we arrived at the Medipol Hospital, and we were already on the program for the operation on July 27. They only needed a couple of days to prepare us. Everything was perfectly organized, they performed up to ten examinations a day, they also organized an interpreter for us, we met the doctor, the transplant team. The only complaint I have is that it all costs a lot.

Dragiša is in a terrible state at that moment. He overslept the whole way, he wasn’t even aware of what was happening, he was very exhausted, he was simply running out of strength. And no matter how hard I tried to give him strength, he didn’t expect that surgery to be the solution. While he was being prepared for the operation, there was no pain, but after the transplant was completed, the pain returned and he had the same attacks as in Serbia.

The transplant went well, the doctor said I donated a good kidney and after 4 days I got up and started walking. Dragiša was released from the hospital after 15 days, but as the stomach pains returned, he was returned to the hospital. However, they corrected his diet, the pain started to decrease and we returned to Serbia after a month.

After returning home, the son began to recover, to live, to walk, to eat more diversely.

Today, Dragiša has fully recovered. We celebrated our anniversary in the yard. This is where my son played his first round since the surgery.

When I look back on that entire period of our lives today, I realize that I was guided by the slogan that life is a struggle and that we are now running the marathon of life and that I have to win in that race, to win a gold medal. That kept me going. It gave me strength. People tell me that I am the mother of courage. I think that is the most noble thing that a parent can do for their child, to give him a part of himself and thus, for the second time, give him life. For that you have to find strength and tell yourself that there is no surrender until victory.

Find out more about the Most important calling in life campaign at: www.najvaznijipoziv.rs

Source: BIZLife

Photo: Hemofarn Foundation