A WOMAN who suffered complete kidney failure after losing a baby has thanked her mum for the greatest gift there is - her life.

Thirty-five-year-old Katherine Grove suffered kidney failure when she lost her baby 31 weeks into her pregnancy, so her Cookley mum Pat volunteered one of her kidneys. She is the latest winner of the Shuttle/Times and News / Wyre Forest Community Housing Three Cheers Award.

Katherine, who lives with her partner and 10-year-old son in Barn Owl Place, Kidderminster, said words could not express how grateful she was to her mum.

I can never thank mum enough for kidney gift

A MUM has given her daughter the gift of life for a second time - by donating a kidney to her.

Katherine Grove, now 35, suffered complete kidney failure after losing a baby.

She was too ill to have a kidney from a dead donor - so her mum Pat, 57, from Cookley, immediately offered up one of hers.

Now both women are recovering well after undergoing a successful swap operation last month.

"Words can never express how grateful I am to mum," said Katherine, who lives with partner Steve and son Sam, 10, in Barn Owl Place, Spennells, Kidderminster.

"There was no question in her mind from the moment I suffered kidney failure that she wanted to donate one of hers to me.

"She's made a massive sacrifice, putting her own life on the line."

Mum Pat has now become the fourth recipient of a Three Cheers! award - the Shuttle/Times and News community awards scheme sponsored by Wyre Forest Community Housing.

She said: "I just feel I did what any mum would do. My daughter was ill and I could do something to help her. I don't see it as a big sacrifice."

The dramatic events leading up to the transplant were triggered one night in December 2001, while Katherine was 31 weeks pregnant.

She was rushed to hospital in the early hours with internal bleeding and doctors discovered her unborn baby had died. During the subsequent delivery, she suffered complete kidney failure, initially thought to be a temporary consequence of the trauma.

But her kidneys never recovered and Katherine was told haemo-dialysis was the only option. She had to undergo dialysis three times a week for five hours a time at Birmingham's Queen Elizabeth Hospital before discovering she was unsuitable to go on the kidney transplant list.

"I was really poorly and my life expectancy was not good. Additional health problems were discovered with my blood so my only hope was a matched live transplant."

Mum and daughter underwent the operation together on May 19.

Pat was back home 10 days later and has now gone back to her full-time job at Beatties department store in Wolverhampton, while Katherine had to stay in for several extra weeks to fully recover from her ordeal.

But now she is finally home and delighted with the dramatic change in her life.

"My quality of life has improved already and should continue to get better and better. I no longer have to spend three days in every week on dialysis and just feel so much better in myself.

"It's still early days but hopefully things will eventually be completely normal. I can never thank mum enough."