BEING a teenager is not easy — with the stress of exams and peer pressure.

But 15-year-old Adam Bhaiji has an extra weight on his shoulders as he must have kidney dialysis three times a week and is on 24-hour alert in case a suitable transplant donor is found.

Adam, of Allendale Gardens, off Blackburn Road, Halliwell, was diagnosed with kidney problems just after he was born.

He has grown up knowing he will eventually need a kidney transplant.

The Sharples School pupil has dialysis at the Royal Manchester Children’s Hospital for four hours at a time.

But he does not let it hold him back and it is a “school leader”

with excellent grades.

He started dialysis in April, 2010, after losing weight — a telltale sign of kidney failure — when he went into renal failure.

Adam, a Year 11 pupil, said: “I don’t worry about it because there is always someone worse off, so you have to appreciate what you have got.

“Dialysis makes me very tired, but there are children who are four years old who have to have dialysis five times a week.”

Due to his illness, Adam, who hopes to go on to study A-levels and then engineering at university, is unable to take holidays abroad or miss dialysis sessions.

He said: “I don’t want to be treated with sympathy. I try to be positive about everything.

“It could be 10 years until I get a transplant. I will just take it as it comes because at the end of the day it will make me better.”

Adam lives with his parents, Ismail and Rehana Patel, and his two sisters, aged 19 and 23.

Mrs Patel, an administration assistant at St Matthew’s Primary School in Kentford Road, Bolton, said: “I knew Adam would be able to cope with the dialysis, it doesn’t bother him.

“When he was born, and he was ill, it was like starting a rollercoaster ride. But I have always had a lot of support so I have been able to cope.”