Renal failure won’t dent Olympic dream

Katherine Paton is not letting anything stop her striving towards her Olympic dream.

Paton is a member of the national rhythmic gymnastics team that is attempting to qualify for the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo but her story is more inspirational than most could even imagine.

The 24-year-old, who is now seeking her second kidney donor, suffers from end-stage renal failure.

Undergoing dialysis four times a day does not stop Paton from training for more than four hours each day for six days of the week. The dialysis is the only thing keeping her alive.

In 2008, Paton’s mother Sandra Paton gave her one of her kidneys but after eight years her body began to reject the kidney and it had to be removed.

Sandra Paton and her daughter have continued to stay positive as they wait for news of a new donor.

‘‘As you can see she’s not sitting around moping about it, she’s moving on,’’ she told Seven Sharp.

Paton and her team-mates will soon embark on a five-week tour of Russia, Belarus and Bulgaria as they prepare for their Olympic qualifiers.

Paton has to transport her dialysis fluids to all of her training and competition venues. She is currently organising dozens of boxes of fluid for her dialysis treatment to be sent around the world so it will be in each of her locations when she arrives.