Tina Turner opens up about the time when her husband saved her life by donating one of his kidneys to her.
In her autobiography, My Love Story, the multi-award-winning singer mentioned that she was recovering from cancer and a stroke when she discovered that her kidneys were only functioning at 20 percent and were rapidly failing.
She went on to say that her husband, Erwin Bach, made the life-changing decision to give her one of his kidneys. “Only the transplant would give me a good chance of a near-normal life. But the chances of getting a donor kidney were remote,” Turner wrote.
The singer added that she didn’t want to live her life on a machine. “It wasn’t my idea of life. But the toxins in my body had started taking over. I couldn’t eat. I was surviving but not living. I began to think about death.”
Turner added, “If my kidneys were going, and it was time for me to die, I could accept that. It was OK. When it’s time, it’s really time.”
The book also reveals that Tina Turner had signed up for assisted suicide before her husband made his decision to save her life.
According to Tina, her husband didn’t want to be with another woman or want to start another life. “Then he shocked me. He said he wanted to give me one of his kidneys.” After going through the proper channels, the couple underwent successful surgery in April 2017.
“The best moment was when Erwin came rolling into my room in his wheelchair,” she said. “He somehow managed to look good, even handsome, as he greeted me with an energetic: ‘Hi, darling!’ I was so emotional- happy, overwhelmed, and relieved that we’d come through this alive.”