Wife donates kidney after husband develops cancer

Zionsville, Indiana – The first time Frederic and Valentina crossed paths was in Venezuela.

“I was dating a Venezuelan girl who happened to be a friend of hers. My girlfriend at the time said ‘Hey, I have some friends coming to the party and one of them, it’s their birthday.’ It was her birthday, so we met on her birthday.”

Valentina explained, “He believed that I was a quiet young lady.”

The pair has been married for nine years and has been blessed with two lovely children during this time. The glorious existence that lay in wait for them was suddenly called into doubt. It was determined that Frederic was suffering from a virus that affected his kidneys. Around twenty years had passed by the time his physicians finally convinced him that he needed to do something about it.

“I started having some issues. I went to the doctor and found out one of my kidney’s had cancer,” he said.

Doctors advised Frederic to have a kidney donor, and the procedure started. Thousands of people across the nation are dealing with it.

“The search obviously began with my immediate family, my parents, my brother, and my sister. As they eliminated people for specific reasons, whether medical or not compatible, the next person was my wife, Valentina,” he said.

For Frederic’s benefit, his ideal partner in life was also the ideal partner for bringing him into the world.

“You don’t know how much you want to do something like that until you are in a situation to do it, so it was pretty cool,” she said.

IU Health was responsible for the donation. Frederic and Valentina give the hospital and personnel praise for the smooth operation.

“We found out that IU here is one of the largest centers that does that type of stuff so we reached out. We had some friends who happened to know someone who recommended a doctor here. We set up an appointment and talked to them and they really set us at ease as to what we needed to do,” he said.

Even though Frederic claims Valentina doesn’t hold his sacrifice against him, let’s just say he takes extra care to remember to take the trash out.

“Those things still happen. I still get my daily dose of ‘Honey do’ lists,” he said.

“We don’t talk about it. We don’t think about it,” Valentina said.

“She doesn’t hold it over my head, no, but she does still say, ‘Hey you forgot to take the garbage, you forgot to do this.’”

Maybe they’ll celebrate Valentine’s Day this year with a kidney-shaped candy box rather than a heart-shaped one.