Immediately following the life-saving kidney transplant from her best friend Francia Raísa, Selena Gomez suffered a life-or-death complication.
Raísa told W Magazine that Gomez needed a second medical procedure after the transplant.
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“I woke up and had a text from her that said, ‘I’m really scared.’ My kidney was very active, and when it turned I broke an artery,” Raísa said, adding that doctors rushed Gomez back into surgery and removed a vein from her leg to build an artery to keep the new kidney in place.
“She could have died,” the Grown-ish actress said.
Gomez had previously explained that there were some complications after the kidney transplant, but it was unknown how severe of a situation the singer was dealing with.
Back in December, the singer was seen with a scar on her leg while celebrating New Year’s eve with friends and Justin Bieber in Cabo San Lucas; the scar is likely a result of the complication.
In her interview, Raísa also revealed she immediately wanted to get tested to become a potential donor for Gomez, who she was living with at the time.
“She was asking me about my day and she grabbed a water bottle out of the fridge and tried to open it and couldn’t. Then she threw it on the floor, and she fell to the floor and started crying,” Raísa said. “I was like, ‘What is wrong with you?’ She said, ‘I need a new kidney. I don’t know what I’m going to do, the waitlist is seven to 10 years.’ And it just came out of me, and I said, ‘I’ll get tested.’ I called her assistant behind her back to get the information, and that’s how the process started.”
After the three-hour surgery, Raísa admitted that “recovery was hard,” adding that she didn’t want to eat or drink anything.
“We didn’t want to tell anybody [about the surgery] because recovery was very hard for us, and we went through a depression at the time,” Raísa said. “We kind of just wanted to be normal and not have that attention on us. I really left it up to her. I’ve never had anything personal come out about me before. I’ve dated very famous people, and no one knows because I’m very private. I was like, ‘Did you have to be famous?’”
