00:02It was 2018 when Bindal Juru and Kanju man Cody noticed the first symptoms.
00:09Then I started getting headaches pretty bad, like massive migraines.
00:14I was waking up in immense pain and it would take about an hour or an hour and a half
00:18to kind of settle down.
00:20Eventually he saw a doctor who kept him overnight.
00:24They noticed that my blood pressure was really high, so we're talking about 280 over 180, which is well beyond
00:35heart attack material.
00:37Cody was eventually diagnosed with the degenerative kidney disease IgA nephropathy.
00:43Kidney function in 2019 was about 45% and then by 2024 it was around 16%.
00:54His brother Sajjan, who works at ABC Radio, was in Darwin when he heard they were going to put Cody
01:01on dialysis.
01:02It didn't really take me long to put my hand up to say, well, if you need a kidney I
01:11might have one.
01:12With the brother's kidneys almost 100% compatible, surgery went ahead.
01:18Family rallied behind them, their mum worried for her kids.
01:22And even the night before, she would grab us all in together.
01:29She's like, we're going to be okay.
01:32It was, it was really, it was really happy.
01:37But, you know, it kind of also reminded me how important this is for her as well as Cody.
01:46Once I had the transplant, I got the kidney and I woke up pretty much straight after the surgery a
01:53few hours afterwards.
01:54It was like a night and day difference.
01:56And I'm like, wow, this is what I'm actually supposed to be feeling like.
02:00Sajjan's partner Lee works in organ donation and understands the rarity of First Nations to First Nations living donations.
02:08I know that one of the Aboriginal healthcare practitioners in Queensland talked about in his six or seven years, he'd
02:15never seen it.
02:16In the Territory, I know living donation is very rare, even outside of the First Nations cultural factors.
02:24We want mob to know that it can be done and it works.
02:29I'm living proof that it works.
02:31Giving the gift of a lifetime.
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