My dream is to be a support to the ill father

Sveta is 38 years old, looking at her pictures and reading her posts in social networks, one would never say that she cannot move and feels constant pain. Sveta has reuhmathoid arthritis in joint-visceral form. Her big and small joints are also affected as well as internal organs.

Rheumatologists call this illness “joints cancer” and patinets call it “hell on Earth” due to the constant pain. Svitlana’s locomotor apparatus is fully affected and Ukrainian medicine treats such patients as hopeless.

Svitlana hasn’t been out for almost sixteen years because she cannot walk, jump or swim. Her life is complicated by the fact that she lives with her 77 years old farther, who is a pensioner and was diagnosed with second stage of cancer and number of other illnesses. Svitlana’s mother has passed away in 2000 from blood cancer. At the moment Svetlana is taking care of her farther and her farther is taking care of her. Her farther helps her to conduct the easiest actions: he feeds her, combs her hair, dresses her, helps her to seat. To go out or take bath, she needs external help. She could stay at home for years and wait for bath for months. But Sveta doesn’t give up. She is journalist and writes articles for local newspapers, writes in social networks.

Several years ago she found German doctors who agreed to take her case. It took her 5 years to collect needed sum and the surgery significantly improved her quality of life. Now she can get up from wheel chair, move around her apartment and learn hot to manage steps. For her knees to unbend, she needs another surgery that will cost 37.000 EURO. She raised some funds and at the moment she needs 21.000 EURO. This money wont only help her to stand and walk, this money would help her to start new life and to be support for her farther.

When Svitlana talks about herself, she talks about her dream. The dream we all can fulfill: “I cannot walk… I never had an opportunity to touch my toe tips with my fingers… I cannot turn in my bed and cannot manage my blanket… I cannot seat by myself, only when I lean against something… I cannot stand up by myself, cannot seat on a toilet, cannot get into bath, cannot manage steps… These all is equal to climbing Everest for me. My wish is to touch my toe fingers with my fingers and for the first time in my life – to cut nails by myself”.

Name: Svitlana Papenko, 02.11.1978

City: Zaporizhia

Diagnosis: juvenile rheumatoid arthritis articular-visceral form with a lesion of large and small joints, and internal organs, osteoporosis