Two Year Lung Transplant Anniversary!!!

Two Year Ago a Stranger Saved My Life

I am humbled and very grateful that 24 months ago a stranger gave me a precious gift. 

Now that gift lives within me and has given me a new life. 

5am on Monday 4 October 2010 I was given a new set of lungs from a 45yr old man a heart beating donor and  my life changed forever.

I remember the day vividly, the long day waiting to see if it was a yes or no, the tearful goodbye to my family outside the operating theater, but it also feels like a lifetime ago at the same time - in a sense it is!

I was dying, my old life was coming to a end and I wasn't sure if I would see Christmas that year. My lungs were down to the volume of a coke can and oxygen was my constant companion. If you want to read how bad things had got have a look at Waiting One Year On

How are things now?

It took a while for me to recover and for the first year things were up and down it took me 18 months to feel like myself again but now things are good.  I have been able to start to work through my list of things to do when I got my new lungs 

Walk in the countryside

I am able to walk in the countryside and take photos again:) I am not able to walk all day like when I was younger but I don't have to worry about parking next to somewhere I want to go to. I was able to go on a photowalk at Rutherford Appleton Lab which I found challenging but I was able to keep up with others.

Swimming  

I am able to swim again and am doing quite well. 

After 7 weeks since I started swimming again after nearly ten years, I have improved from not being able to  swim a length of the 25m pool without stopping because I was out of breath to my present level.

I am now able to swim three miles each week. 

I do at least a mile each session and it now takes me about a hour and half to do 64 lengths. I am able to swim the whole mile without stopping now. I was told by the one of the lifeguard I am swimming further weekly than any of their lifeguards do.

I have gained so much confidence from doing this and feel much fitter now.

This is something I had found this hard since I found out after a MRI, that a previous back injury has deteriorated since my transplant and is now leading to a bit of sciatic discomfort upon walking and running is a non starter

This last week I managed to do 70 lengths but as long as I manage a mile each time I am happy I am only able to do breast stroke at present but I am aiming to improve my use of the crawl and increase the distance I can swim using it, then maybe I will be able to do more lengths as I can swim faster using the crawl.  

Fishing

This is something that I have get to sort out. I hope that my son and I will be able to get out over the winter and do a bit of pike fishing and maybe next year it will possible to get out on a boat and do some sea fishing.

Glastonbury Tor

I had hope that I would be able to attend Glastonbury festival this year but unfortunately I was unable to do this.I still use overnight Bi-Pap and this means that I would need to have access to power to use this and my nebuliser and unfortunately this is not possible as camping is the order of the day when you attend the festival.I hope in the future it might be possible but not just yet.

I would still like to go to Glastonbury town and walk up the tor and will hopefully do this soon. 

Motorbike

those of you who have read the blog for a while will know that my mother recently passed away suddenly in June at the age of 80 yrs thanks to my donor i was able to celebrate her birthday with her and the family but sadly she was unable to celebrate my birthday with me in August. 

But her legacy has allowed me to consider a personal goal that I set myself before my transplant to ride a motorbike again before I die. I hope that I will be able to realize this goal in the near future maybe even go to the TT on the Isle of man.

Day to Day 

Things are good I recently went to Harefield Hospital  for a overnight stay to get my abdominal CT scan done. This was to check the reason for intermittent swelling in my right leg. 

They put me on a drip to protect my kidneys from the contrast dye they use in the scan.

Made a few holes in my arms and found nothing to indicate why my leg has been swelling.

The positive is they also found nothing untoward that would cause concern so I was pleased about that.

I have continued to lose weight and have been using the pedometer to encourage me to walk more. 

I will now be going onto monthly meetings for the next nine months at my weight loss group and will be meeting up with the group on Friday to arrange some meetings for weekly support.

The final duty to my mum will be happening this month on the 19th when we lay her ashes to rest at the local village church 

St Mary the Virgin in Kidlington

I have fond memories of this church and my brother had his wedding blessed there. It is a lovely place for the children to visit and I hope that mum will be happy there I hope that I will be able to make her proud with my continued improving health and fitness. 

The new season has started at the camera club and we have our first members evening tonight.I will be putting some pictures into a completion from my recent photowalk at  RAL,

Model of telescope in visitors center at RAL

I have also done a few night pictures and am hoping to learn more about my most recent purchase, a new 430 Canon Flash gun.

With the new committee in place and the new website up and running Wallingford photographic Club 

It all feels very positive, there are still some of my pictures on the site if you look in the competition galleries. I hope that I will be able to have my own gallery in the near future in the members area watch this space....    

  

Hope you have enjoyed reading this blog and if you haven't signed the donor register yet you can by clicking 

HERE 

Help someone else have new life after you are gone  

But please let your loved ones know your wishes so they will know what you wanted to happen :)

Things Are Getting Better Now

I am feeling much better now and feel that the shingles has finally gone!! 

Good things have been happening with my photography and I have started a new page on my G+ account. You may have seen this on the widget on the right hand column of the blog.

Many people are starting a business page to promote their photography or company but I felt that I would like to share information from all over the world about transplantation, developments and up to date research.
The other function of the page is to offer somewhere for people to publicly state their support for transplantation and Join a group for transplant advocates at
Group As a listing of people on G+ who have signed the register.

You can visit my new page Transplant News and I would love it if you +1ed it share it and add the page to your circles so that you will be able to get the news that is shared.


Other things to report is that I am about to start my pulmonary rehabilitation  course again on Friday with a assessment of my fitness then I will start the six week course on the Wednesday and Friday the following weeks this is happening at the local gym and although I started the course once before I had to stop because of the case of shingles that I got :-(   I am looking forward to it and will be on it till early in January when I hope to continue with my fitness improvements with the extra impetus of new year resolutions to fire my enthusiasm.I have yet to brave a swimming pool although I have been told I could as the extra weight I have put on is a bit of an embarrassment.

I am also hoping to go fishing again after getting the okay from Harefields team at my last appointment might be that i try a bit of pike fishing first with spinners and plugs.I realised that the last time i when fishing was back in 2007 when I caught this pike with my son

  I am hoping now I can breath a bit better I will be able to catch a bigger one!   

My photography is coming along well and in the first competition of the season I scored two 17s with my first two entries I thought I would include them for your comments 

dragonfly

This was taken at the Oxford University arboretum local to us, when I was taking pictures of the fall

Steller's Sea Eagle

This massive eagle was flown at a local event near us in the town as part of the attractions and stood three feet tall it had talons the size a child's hand a very impressive bird can be seen flying at Warwick Castle which is were the hawk show is based

One final bit of good new is that one of the pictures that I took on my holiday before the transplant is being used in the local camera club regional competition "The Rose Bowl" run by

CHILTERNS ASSOCIATION of CAMERA CLUBS in the first round our club won the round!!!  

I have been told that my picture scored highly at 19/20 I have included a copy of the picture for you to see it was called "winging it "

  let me know what you think?

If you like these pictures I have been including these and others in my G+ photo blog along with other inspiring pictures that I have found around the internet. 

You can see them at  Marks Photo Blog

The last bit of nice news is that one of my photos is being published in a calender being arranged by a couple of the club for sale to members if you want to see the photo it is on the club website 

Wallingford Photographic Club