In the ultimate act of love, a young Hastings man has given his partner the gift of life – one of his kidneys. Recovering at home just days after the successful transplant, Tama Hutana
says he’d do it all again in a heartbeat after seeing what his partner Sophie Kereama has been through.
And if that name sounds familiar, it is. In a remarkable coincidence, Sophie’s dad is a first cousin to broadcaster Grant Kereama, who donated a kidney to rugby legend Jonah Lomu, and Grant’s sister Justine, who donated a kidney to Whanganui nine-year-old Mya Tamatea, the daughter of a childhood friend.
Like their stories, Sophie and Tama’s is also one of love and selflessness. The 24-year-old sweethearts have known each other for little more than two years. They met, laughs Sophie,
on dating app Tinder.
She was at teacher’s college in her home-town of Palmerston North, while he was in Hawke’s Bay, working for Te Rangihaeata Oranga Trust, an organisation working with problem gamblers.
A brief long-distance relationship ensued, before Sophie moved to Hastings to be with Tama in April last year. It was around that time Sophie’s health began to really deteriorate. Always “a sickly child”, Sophie suffered from Crohn’s disease since her early teens.
Her symptoms were controlled with medication, but doctors have since told her they believe the medication she was taking for Crohn’s contributed to kidney failure, which first started when she was 18.
“My renal failure was relatively stable up until last year, when I started teaching. I was catching colds, tummy bugs, you name it, and was in and out of hospital. I was getting sicker and sicker.”
So ill, in fact, she was told she’d need a kidney transplant within a year. While the plucky primary school teacher took it in her stride, her parents Sean and Janine were devastated.
“Mum’s a nurse, so she knows all the issues, but I was like, ‘Oh, well, just another thing to add to my list.’ The biggest thing for me was having to stop work. I’ve wanted to be
a teacher all my life and here I was so sick, I couldn’t even get to the classroom.”
Mum Janine and her sister Katrina put their hands up to be donors. They faced months of rigorous screening – blood and urine tests, scans and psychological testing – to ensure they were compatible and could withstand losing a kidney.
“From day one, Mum said she would be a donor and my auntie, who I’m really close to, said to put her name down as well, just in case. They were having a bit of a competition.”
It was a brief contest. “My mum had been successful testing the whole way through. In fact, we went down to Wellington in August, where the transplant was going to be done, thinking we were going to get a transplant date. Instead, we were told they had reassessed the scans and she was too high risk.”
But more heartbreak was to come. Janine’s high count of creatinine – a chemical waste product usually removed from the body by the kidneys – meant she couldn’t be a donor either.
Tama, meanwhile, was becoming increasingly worried as he watched Sophie’s health worsen. She was vomiting on a daily basis and becoming so weak, she was incapable of doing the lightest of chores. She was so ill that when doctors gave her the option to start dialysis in August, she took it.
“Mum was upset about that too because basically once you start dialysis, that’s it. It’s either a transplant or you’re on dialysis for life.”
By far the youngest in the renal unit at Hastings Hospital, the three-hour, thrice-weekly sessions were tough. “She would put on a brave face so others wouldn’t worry about her,” says Tama. “Seeing what the illness was doing to Sophie and how it was affecting her life, that was the biggest decider for me.”
Donating his kidney meant giving up his beloved rugby for a season, and having to take sick and annual leave to cover lost income in the weeks he would be off work. Sophie says, “I was quite reluctant to use him as a donor. He’d never even experienced a broken bone before, let alone had surgery, and rugby is an absolute passion, so this was a huge deal for him.”
Tama knew “nothing at all” about renal failure or organ donors before meeting Sophie. He read other donors’ stories to gain insight into the process, and grilled Justine on her pre-op experience and recovery.
The couple were given just three weeks’ notice for a transplant date. Sophie was by Tama’s side as he was wheeled into the operating theatre at Wellington Hospital on October 5 and he was waiting in her room after her operation.
“It was sad seeing him go in,” she remembers. “I can’t say I wasn’t worried something might go wrong, but we were both really excited. It was like, ‘Yeah, let’s do this, love you, good luck, see you later!’”
Sophie’s beloved puppies Pepe and Ushi were left in the safe hands of her father, while other family members took turns at their bedsides. Now back in Hastings recovering, the couple are full of praise for the medical teams in Hawke’s Bay and Wellington, and for each other. They are, they say, closer than ever.
“Tama was discharged a week before me and it was really hard being separated after our journey together,” says Sophie. “Even if he hadn’t given me a kidney, it wouldn’t change how I feel about him.
“I appreciate how big a deal this was for him and his family, and it really showed me how much he truly loved me, even though I would never have questioned it.”
Tama, who’s the youngest of 12, tells, “When I first decided to donate, I was worried about my family. But they were very proud and supportive, which made the process much easier for me.
“I think anyone in my position would want to do the same. I didn’t give my kidney to prove that I love Sophie, but it was an easier decision to make because I do.”
