No one but us

The paratroopers have such a motto: "No one but us." The specific meaning depends on the circumstances each time

Eduard Larionov is a paratrooper. He served in the Transcaucasian military district, participated in peacekeeping operations in the Caucasus. In the nineties, when there was nothing to have in the country, and Katerina’s first daughter Katerina was born to the paratrooper Larionov, he returned from the service, he sat down on the wagon and won the trucker for more than ten years. Once he reached Ukhta, where there were no roads. And once, Eduard took hostages of the bandits and kept more than a week in a dense forest on the water. We searched for smuggling in a truck. After this stress, when he practically said goodbye to his life, Eduard had hereditary diabetes. That time he recalls as the hardest in life. And about what is happening now, says with a smile: "There are enough tablets so far."

Eduard is restored after the second bone marrow transplantation. Both times the donor was his eldest daughter. The same Katerina, whom dad mined with honest labor, all the best, rolled on the truck, carried it on campaigns and carefully hid a deadly diagnosis from her: primary myelofibrosis - a disease of the hematopoietic system.

Big family

He hid oncology not only from Katya. Eduard has four children: two daughters from his first marriage, the adoptive son of his native sister who died of diabetes, and the youngest daughter, is also a adopted, whom Edward replaced his father, married a second time.

Eduard fell ill almost immediately, as his second family formed in 2010. And for a long time was treated secretly, lay in the hospital with "non -hazardous" diagnoses. My wife Irina found out about everything first, and only when Eduard had already increased the spleen, and such weakness was found that it was no longer possible to hide everything. Irina found out what to do, and, having received an appointment from doctors in the clinic of the Nii named after Raisa Gorbacheva, Katya called on the eve of her birthday.

Eduard and his dog Nyusha photo: Alexey Loshchilov for TD

The treatment regimen suggested expensive drugs, first the bill went on hundreds of thousands of rubles.
After listening to Irina, Katya hung up the phone and the remaining 15 minutes before the "birthday" cried bitterly. These were the strongest tears, although then there were still a lot of tears, but Katya almost did not remember others, because she cried them, already standing “on the front line”, fighting every day with his dad for his life. And then, as if having received a blow under her knees, she was exhausted and fell, feeling how the foundation of her world is strong and calm, as a large turtle on which the earthly firmament rests, swam, leaving a gaping black void in his place.

Looking into this abyss for long fifteen minutes, Katya decided to act. She came to the hospital with a confident smile, in which from that very day it was read: "I am nearby, I will help." And dad, in turn, smiling and jokingly, replied: “The sore is a stage. We will win - and we will live! " Doctors told relatives: "Once joke, it means that everything goes according to plan." But the plan turned out to be intricate.

A coin for happiness

From the course to the course of treatment, Eduard became a little better, then worse, then hope was squeamish again. The exhausting long distance gave the family an increasing love, weaving it from daily meetings, support, watched together films, memories and experiences of childhood scrolled on an imaginary film projector. Dad and daughter spent a lot of time together, as if making up for the missed. “I really lacked my dad as a child, Sasha’s sister was more fortunate, she saw him more, he then moved to the car crane already,” Katya recalls. - True, when my parents divorced, I lived with my dad. But then I was a teenager, not that difficult, but by a teenager - I know everything better than anyone, independent and in general. She hung somewhere with friends, fell in love, studied and only called: "Dad, I will not come today." Dad courageously accepted everything, without showing his excitement. And now, when I myself became a mother, I understand how he worried about me. ”

The money that first gathered the forces of the family began to collect more and more difficult. My wife Irina persuaded Eduard to contact the Advita Foundation, but the former paratrooper did not believe in funds. So life has developed - I’m used to relying only on himself and reluctantly retreated from his male principles.

But Irina, whom Eduard calls in this story the “main engine”, nevertheless turned to the fund. As soon as Eduard was registered and a page was made on the fund’s website, the fundraising for treatment was activated. And on one ordinary morning, thousands of people read in the newspaper Metro about which Eduard is a caring dad and grandfather about how he worked on an autocrane and built a ring road in St. Petersburg, a new stadium, fountains on Moscow avenue, passing by which in the summer you always want to stop on an area full of sun and spray, and throw a coin there.

Who will eat more

When the possibilities of drug therapy were exhausted, the doctors issued a verdict: bone marrow transplantation is necessary. Eduard does not have their own brothers and sisters who could become donors. There were no “genetic relatives” in the Russian register of bone marrow donors. I had to contact the international register and pay a lot of money. The account went already by millions of rubles, but, using all personal resources and resources of the Advita Foundation, funds were raised, launched the search for a donor, but also to no avail.

Then it was decided to carry out a typification (verification of genetic compatibility) of both daughters. With children, compatibility more than 50% is rare, but Katya immediately felt that she would become a donor.

Eduard watches the film "Carnival Night" Photo: Alexey Loshchilov for TD

While preparations for typing were underway, both sisters, who at that time living in the same apartment began a lot and desperately eat. For transplanting bone marrow cells, the body of the donor body is needed: the more it is, the more chances to gain sufficient for transplanting the number of stem cells. The girls were always slim and elegant.

“Sasha, don't eat. Anyway, I will be a donor. I just know, ”Katya said to her younger sister at breakfast, lunch and dinner, but Sasha ate, for every fireman. About a month they competed in eating flour and sweet, drinking it with protein cocktails, jamming with meat and milk assortment. Both gained about five additional kilograms to their modest weight. According to the results of the typification, it turned out that Katya is more suitable, 60% compatibility. And then Katya courageously continued to eat, and Sasha sat on a diet.

Books and travel

“I read books about how to defeat Cancer - Roman Super, Katerina Gordeeva. They help a lot. At first I read it myself, and then gave dad. This is what helped us not to lose heart. And also films about travel - during preparation for the operation, dad and I seemed to have traveled the whole world, depending on one popular channel on YouTube. ”

With the daughter and granddaughter of Varya Photo: From Personal Archive

Katya remembers how she traveled with dad, but hardly recalls how she was put a catheter in a jugular vein, and how she went with him for two days. He remembers how she persuaded him in childhood to jump with her with a parachute, but does not remember how they called the doctors who conducted a transplant, although she was terribly ashamed of this. “They are all brilliant, I will definitely remember what everyone’s name is, please write about them!” And Katya remembers how awkwardly it was to sit in the diapers under the device, in which her blood with bone marrow cells flowed and returned without them. It was necessary to sit for a very long time, it is impossible to disconnect “if necessary”.

“It turned out that“ bone marrow transplantation ”sounds much worse than actually happens. I think this must be called otherwise so that people are not afraid to become donors. It’s just like a blood transfusion, back and forth, but for now this is all happening-you can read, settle down to calm your relatives and friends and even sleep, ”Katya smiles.

One blood

After the transplant, there was a moment of serious complication. Treatment required an urgent blood transfusion. The first positive group was needed today. This moment Katya recalls as a miracle. “When the money was collected, it felt like the strongest support, but when, having thrown a cry on the resources of the fund and on personal pages, I saw the next day the queue of the“ Blood for Larionov ”donated, I felt an incredible climb-as if they had lifted me on the autocrane somewhere to the clouds. On that day, Irina and I and the employees of the Donora Department of the Advita Foundation broke out phones, called and asked for which you can donate blood and whether another group could be given. ”

There was enough blood then and even remained for others. And together, new forces appeared in the blood, and the belief that a long struggle is not in vain, and that the disease will be repulsed at all costs. The motto of the paratroopers “Nobody but us” worked in full, and Edward was not used to bringing it down and reached a new stage of his main battle.

Eduard photo: Alexey Loshchilov for TD

The story of the transplant did not end there. When the cathies of the cells began to strike and not take root, she was angry with them and even talked with them: “What are you? This is my favorite and dear dad in the world! ” And dad flickered for a day long, dad lost weight, fell, packed cones and hematomas, stopped walking. Katya blamed herself. And a month later I decided on another transplant. That is, how she decided. There was no choice. The second time was more difficult. The body did not have time to recover after complex manipulations. Brows and ailments were much stronger at times. But Katya said: “Dad, I’ll come today”-and came every day to the transplantation, and he met her with a smile on his native, earthy-gray face. The second time the cells took root even worse, and Katya blamed herself again. No one except her knew how bad the dad was, although now all family members were on duty with him, leaving him for a minute. Day after day. Month after a month. Both cells and family members became more and more relatives.

Now the cathies of the cells have already taken root. But Eduard is still a long way to enter a stable remission, although Katya says that there is no more fear of illness. She understood the main thing that her dad knew before her birth: no one but us.

No one but us will become a donor of blood, or bone marrow. No one, besides us, will issue a regular donation for the Advita Foundation, which should always have huge resources to support patients. No one but us will save the one who dies without this help right now. Nobody. Except us.

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