Rene

Today's amazing story was reblogged from "Through my Porthole."  Enjoy!

Maybe René’s life journey impacted me so deeply because he is so close to our eldest son’s age. This sweet young man displayed not a shadow of bitterness over the circumstances of his life. My heartfelt prayer is that his ‘tomorrows’ look a whole lot different to his ‘yesterdays’.

Rene had never been this far from home before. Pic Katie Keegan

He does not know why his mother left him. René was just five years old when suddenly he had a ‘new family’, and so many chores he was never able to attended school – ever. He worked for his keep from that day forward.

René remembers the moment a friend mentioned his right eye looked bigger than his left. As he felt no pain and his sight was unaffected, René just ignored it.

When René was 18 he began to notice pressure behind his eye when he exerted himself. He told the family, “But they didn’t care,” he explains softly. He had no money pay a doctor, and no one to help him.

One day followed another until five years passed, and the increasing pressure behind his eye made working in the fields impossible. “I had no idea what it was,” explains René. “I was worried something was growing. I felt like something was pushing, [that] my eye would pop out. When I rested, the pressure would stop but when I started again, the pressure would return.”

So René returned to kitchen work, but his eye continued to distort.

Life turned around the day René’s friend shared about a TV program about Mercy Ships. “This organisation is doing free surgery. They can help you – there is a free screening.” So together they went, and René was finally offered the help that had been so far out of his reach.

Rene was blown away by his new look &  his xrays

René had a very complex surgery. The slow-growing tumour filled René’s sinuses, pushed down his throat and into his cranium. This hungry yet benign growth had relentlessly pushed his eye forward, and would have continued to expand.

The six-hour operation was performed by Dr Gary Parker,  and Dr Mark Shrime.  Dr Gary explains, “This kind of tumour usually starts in the nose and is corrected with a small operation. But because René didn’t have access to safe, effective and affordable surgery, it grew into something very complicated.”

Recovery from the intricate procedure was swift and complete.  25 year-old René can now see clearly, breathe easily, and his headaches are gone. “The surgery went really well,” he announced. “The tumor won’t grow back anymore! I am really, really, really happy that the disease that was bothering my life is gone forever and I am able to work. ”

René has plans for the future. “I’m going back to say thank you, then go and find work. I’m going to try farming beans, corn and rice for myself.”

Rene is ready to head into a new future. Pic K.Keegan

(For you medical types, the surgery was a medial mallectomy with frontal craniotermy.)