By Carolyn Cole
Published on July 24, 2008

When Kayla Balliew’s family came to Mustang, Rachel Synco was one of the first people she met — she never imagined two years later she would help prolong her new friend’s life.

Balliew donated her right kidney to Synco in June. Weeks later both young mothers said they are healing faster than they expected.

“This is an awesome opportunity for me, because what are the odds that I am even a match,” Balliew said. “This is an opportunity that God has given me to help, and that is pretty cool. I thought Eve and Naomi needed their mom, and I can’t imagine my kids being without me; I can’t imagine her kids being without her.”

The women met in the nursery at Lakehoma Church of Christ — the Balliew family’s first visit was also newborn Naomi’s first Sunday at church. Naomi is now 2 years old, just a few months younger than Balliew’s son Luke. Balliew’s daughters Heather, now age 9, Libby, 5, and Addie, 4, became playmates with Synco’s Eve, age 6.

A few months after the women started teaching a 3-year-olds in their church’s day school program, Synco started to become sick.

Her body started to reject a kidney she received from her father at 11-years-old, after her own kidneys were damaged by a virus. She said her parents first started noticing symptoms of her illness when she was age 4.

Synco said she first became concerned about organ rejection after complications during her pregnancy, and added she believes an allergic reaction to the flooring glue in a new home also stressed her system. She was hospitalized in November 2006, weeks after moving into the new home, and stayed there until February 2007. She spent her birthday, Christmas, her wedding anniversary and Valentine’s Day in the hospital.

Naomi was 7 months old when Synco was hospitalized, but she said she believes her tiny daughter felt her mother’s absence. She said family members told her Naomi didn’t crawl or try to walk until she came home.

While she was hospitalized or sick, Synco said Balliew and several other friends looked after her daughters.

“They were always so happy, and I never had to worry about them,” she said.
In spring 2007, doctors put Synco on dialysis and suggested she begin searching for a kidney donor.

She was placed on the national list in May, but at first Synco said she thought it was unnecessary. Thirteen years earlier her mother had tested as a compatible match, and Synco said she always counted on her as a backup kidney.

“She had been for years,” she said. “There was always this unspoken agreement — if I needed one, I was going to take hers. It was a horrible surprise to find out she was no longer a match. I had built up antibodies during my pregnancies and we were no longer compatible.”

Several of her other relatives volunteered to be tested, but none of them matched. When her friends at church offered to take the tests, Synco said she knew the chances of any of them matching were a long shot, and even when Balliew’s results came back with compatible tissue and blood types, she couldn’t let her hopes rise.

“The odds are ridiculous,” Balliew said.

When she received those first preliminary positive results, Balliew said she and her husband Richard talked late into the night about the risks the surgery and donation could pose to her own health.

As they talked, Balliew said they couldn’t imagine Synco’s two daughters, who they had helped care for as their own, living without their mother. She said they made a commitment to see the tests through.

“If we are going to go on we are in it for the long haul,” she said. “We are going to assume everything is going to check out — we are going to do this.”

In February, doctors put Balliew through dozens of medical tests and examinations, including drawing 30 vials of blood, chest x-rays and heart strength tests.

While Balliew faced the exams believing she would be cleared to donate her kidney, Synco said she couldn’t allow herself to feel her friend’s optimism because she knew any one of the tests could rule her out as a donor.

“I knew that was it,” she said. “I knew that would be the end of that for her, and we would be back to square one.”

“There is no reason why it shouldn’t have,” Balliew said.

It took more than a month for doctors to contact Balliew about the results, and in that time, both women lost hope. Then, “out of the blue,” she got a call to schedule her next appointment to move forward with the kidney donation.

They set the date for June 9.

That morning their families crowded into a waiting room filled with praying church members and friends. Synco said both surgeries went well, except her surgeon was 40 minutes late.

Doctors took Balliew’s right kidney and inserted it in Synco’s left side. In a way, she now has four kidneys — the two she was born with have shriveled to the size of peas, her first donated kidney, which had failed almost completely before the surgery, and Balliew’s healthy organ.

Synco said Balliew’s quick recovery surprised her. Within hours of surgery, her friend was sitting up in a chair and greeting relatives in her room. Synco spent the first night in an intensive care unit, and she said she has little memory of that day.

When she woke up Tuesday, Synco said she immediately felt a difference in her body. With the new functioning kidney, she said she noticed she had more energy, needed less sleep and felt more alert.

Before the surgery, Synco said she had to take several naps to make it through the day. Now, she said she is able to live more normally and play with her children.
A month after the surgery both women are still adjusting, and their bodies are healing. Balliew said doctors told her it would take at least six weeks to two months before she’d feel completely healed. While her friend has new found energy, Balliew said she finds she tires more easily but expects that will fade as her body adjusts.

“My one kidney is used to having a pal so now he is having to take over,” she said. “It will take time.”

For Synco, doctors required her to remain at home until her body adapted to new levels of steroids and immunosuppressant drugs, which keeps her immune system from attacking her new kidney. The first few weeks pose a great risk for organ rejection, Synco said.
“Everything is going so amazingly perfect,” she said. “It would have to be something major to go wrong.”

Their families are still worried about them, Balliew said. On their first Sunday back at church, Synco said she had to leave during the service because of a leg cramp.
Balliew said her mother leaned over and asked if she thought Synco was alright.
Balliew joked about signaling her friend through “kidney radar.”

Although the women didn’t gain a psychic connection through the transplant, their lives and families will forever be intertwined.

Balliew said she feels God played a role in their friendship and her family’s move to Oklahoma when her husband became one of eight active Coast Guardsmen in the state stationed at the Federal Aviation Administration.

“This is something I really feel like is calling me,” she said.