Nine months on Transplant Week again

It doesn't seem so long ago that I was tweeting for 2010 Transplant Week but lots has happened since then.

I didn't know when I was tweeting in July last year that I would recieve a transplant before the next transplant week I was like  @tor87  it was the not knowing that was the worst.

Each day waiting, every time if the phone went jumping up, because it could be the hospital phoning with a offer of possible lungs.The stress on the family was intense, the restrictions it placed on my children always needing to have a phone on them and let us know where they were.It was unnatural to young teenagers who should be out having fun. We were waiting for a new life but not sure it would ever happen. 

That is what it is like when you are on the list

Sadly @tor87 is still waiting and she has produced a video about her wait for lungs for transplant week, you can watch it here Victoria Tremlett  she has had seven calls and is still waiting. 

You can read her blog on this site on my blog list "Past the point of no return" 

What could we do to help her? 

simple sign up as organ donors go to the NHSBT site and register online Here

Other people are still waiting 

@asideofonions  who is waiting for a liver transplant 

@alex_f_lambert a toddler who is waiting for a new kidney

 

Mrs Kirstie Tancock an ambassador for"live life and give life" charity 

She was featured on Russell Howard's Good News and has just got married after being on the transplant waiting list for new lungs due to damage caused by Cystic fibrosis. 

She writes the blog "2nd Chance @ Life"

Kirstie is presently in Harefield Hospital transplant unit waiting on her last chance to get new lungs she is slowly deteriorating and will not see her first wedding  anniversary without help.  

Let us all hope she is fortunate and receives her lungs soon

 

For information sake the following is a estimate of waiting times for  organs from NHSBT site

Waiting time to transplant

I got my lungs nine months ago today.

I was fortunate that a 45year old man I never met had the foresight and courage to sign the donor register and let his relatives know his wishes. When he left this world, he left a legacy of a new life for me and others.

I carry his gift inside me now and  no longer breath though the oxygen tubing I depended on.  

I went to my Transplant clinic appointment at Harefield hospital today and it was good news have been told that I can have two months off clinic and got a agreement that I could go on Holiday to the coast in August to visit my wife's relatives and get a break.

Let me hope that the people waiting will not wait for long and that next transplant week the rates of organ donation go up dramatically and enable more people to get the transplant they need.