Me uaua kē ka kitea te momo i a George Moanaroa o Waikato.
Ko ia tētahi o te hunga tokoiti rawa o te ao katoa kua pāngia e te mate taiaki tupu, arā, ko te Acromegaly.
E ai ki ngā tatauranga, kotahi te tangata ki ia rua miriona ka pāngia e te mate nei.
Heoi anō, hei tā George, e whakapono ana ia, he nui te horapatia o tēnei mate ki waenga i te Māori.
“Acromegaly is an overgrowth condition caused by the secreting hormones in the pituitary glands. It is closely related to giantism and is very undiagnosed a lot within Māoridom.”
E whai pānga ana te mate tipua nei ki ngā taiaki tupu o te mata, o ngā ringaringa, o ngā waewae anō hoki. E 40 tau te pakeke o Moanaroa, ka whakatauria e ngā tākuta, kua pāngia ia e tēnei mate i toru tau ki muri.
“I was one of those kids where everyone said you’re a giant.”
“I always had big hands. [A] couple of years prior to being diagnosed, my feet just wouldn’t stop growing.”
Ko te mamae o te puku tana tohumate matua i roto i ngā tau.
“My main [symptom] was having an upset stomach. [I] went to the doctor, he took one look at my hands and realised that I might have acromegaly.”
Nā wai rā, ka pokangia te rae o Moanaroa hei aukati i tā te taiaki tupu horapa i tōna tinana.
‘Te mate tipua—he hītori taketake’
After his surgery, Moanaroa says his recovery was amazing, with the swelling in his fingers, feet, and face shrinking significantly.
He also acknowledges the part that tikanga Māori played in his healing journey.
“Especially with my tūpuna, with my whānau [and] my whakapapa. I was like, we got this.”
“There was a beautiful plane of the two worlds of the Māori and the medical.”
Moanaroa is looking at his condition with an indigenous lens, noting that historical references among iwi taketake around the world.
“Acromegaly is connected to giantism and has a connection to our own giant whakapapa,” he says.
“[It] also has significance to ancient Egyptian lore with the penial gland—that’s where the growth hormone for my acromegaly came from.”
He whakapiki i te aroā mō te acromegaly
E ai ki ngā kōrero ko te acromegaly, he mea tuku iho i roto i te ira tāne, e kaha kitea ana i roto i ngā tāngata 30-50 tau te pakeke.
Ko tā Moanaroa inaianei, he whakamahi i ngā taonga a kui mā a koro mā hei whakaū i ngā mātauranga mō te acromegaly.
“I’m going to be taking acromegaly to the marae; I’ll be taking it directly to our whānau. And I’ll be carrying the message through waiata, whaikōrero, and karakia.”
“Just to be open about it, be as transparent as I can, [because] I’d rather be able to do something for somebody; they’re nothing at all, even if it’s one family member that goes and gets checked up and goes and gets diagnosed—there’s one less Māori that’s passed away because they weren’t recognised.”
