My thanks for 2015

Well, as 2015 draws to a close, I can honestly say I am truly blessed to have been able to make it to my 25th birthday and also Christmas. None of this would of been possible if it wasn't for my donor and his donors family, and all the hard work that Papworth hospital have done! I want to take this chance to thank everyone who has made it possible.

To all the staff at Nottingham University Hospital Wolfson CF Centre that were there through the worst times I can ever remember health wise, you kept me sane and we're the catalyst in me getting my lungs. You didn't stand by and watch me deteriorate anymore unlike others, you actively forced me through and onto the transplant list and saved my lives so to Dr Dewar and Dr Clayton and your simply amazing team THANK YOU!

To Jas and Debs, and all the team at Papworth thank you for giving me the chance to go into the waiting list and believing in me to change my compliance issues around, thank you for allowing me to see another birthday and Christmas and hopefully countless more, and giving me the opportunity to try for a family, get married (eventually) and live a long and prosperous life!

To my donor and you're family, I cannot put into words just how much you have changed mine and my families lives. You have sadly lost your life at such a young age, and now it is my duty unto you to do the things in life you were destined to do, I am not going to sit back and waste the extra time you have given me! I am planning my future with Emily, and we plan to have children, get married and travel as much as possible, all while working hard and hopefully running our own house! 2016 is a year that I would not have seen if it wasn't for you or your family and now it is my chance to excel and kickstart a career that I've wanted to do for over 5 years! Thank you so so much for what you have done for me. You're families selflessness is beyond words and now I will live my life not only for myself and my family, but for you and yours! Thank you to the stranger I never met who saved my life.

2015 has been a massive year for organ donation and Cystic Fibrosis and both have gained way more media attention this year than any other year in my life i can remember. I hope that 2016 builds upon the attention and we eventually see the opt in system changed to opt out and many more transplant operations going ahead! I know many people who have passed away this year waiting for a transplant, I also know countless that have been as lucky as me and received a transplant, but unfortunately not all of them have had the success I have so far had, and they also are no longer with us. I also know way too many people struggling at home and in hospital awaiting double lung transplants! I sincerely hope 2016 brings the gift of life to as many of you as possible and you all come out the other side and do as well if not better than I have done!

I'd like to thank you all for reading my blog and following my journey this year and I'd also like to say that although I haven't updated much since transplant I will be looking into doing a catch up blog in the new year, it will involve details on my new job and also a challenge I have set myself to complete in 2016.

I wish you ALL a very happy, healthy and prosperous 2016 good luck to you all and I hope your wishes and dreams come true!

Invincible?

All my teenage life I thought I was invincible, I thought nothing would stop me. I didn't listen and I didn't care. I would get unwell and my lung function would drop, but I would come back out of hospital after IVs better than ever and I thought I was unstoppable.

I didn't need to listen to the doctors, I didn't need to listen to any of the other patients because I wasn't them it wasn't going to happen to me I was invincible. I was told by the consultants, the nurses, the psychologist, the dietician, my parents, my brother, my grandparents, friends of the family, my friends, other CF patients that were older than me, but I didn't need to listen or pay any attention to that I am Callum, and I was invincible.

Well turns out I'm not, turns out everyone was right. They wasn't just saying it because they had nothing better to be doing with their time. They wasn't saying it so that it improved their health or the length of their lives, turns out they were all doing it because they all cared about me. All them people telling me the same thing but I knew better!

Fast forward to 2015, I'm now 24 and im giving the same lectures I had to younger patients and praying they listen but knowing deep down they won't pay an ounce of attention until that life changing event happens and they almost lose their life like I did! Nobody is invincible when it comes to CF, we all fight against it, but ultimately it will always have an upper hand on our body and the only tool in our armour we have is to do the treatment we are prescribed and keep our lung function as high as possible for as long as possible, but when your lung function is high, treatment isn't high on the list of priorities because 'you can afford to lose a bit' well in reality you can't!

I look back at life and often wonder would I do it any different if I had my time again, and I'd love to say I would, but hand on heart I provably wouldn't. So what gives me the right to tell others what to do? I don't suppose I do have a right, however I just want the best for everyone else, like everyone wanted the best for me!

So if your reading this and your not very compliant with treatment, you miss your tablets, or nebs and think to yourself it'll be ok, I can hand on heart tell you, you won't!
Do you want to be on oxygen 24/7?
Do you want your bedroom being bought downstairs as you can no longer climb stairs?
Do you want to have to be washed by family members at 24 because you haven't got the physical energy to do it yourself?
Do you want to spend like I have recently and will be until I get my call for lungs around 80% of your life in hospital?
Or ultimately do you want to be waiting for a call for a chance of a second shot at life aged 24 when you can live a lot longer with your own lungs?

If the answer to any of those questions was no then I plead with you please try and up the amount of treatment you do as something is better than nothing and everything is better than something!

The stranger

You don't know me, and I don't know you, we may have passed in the street, we probably never have, but a selfless decision you've made will ultimately save my life, the life of someone you've never met and never will meet. Someone who may have completely opposing opinions and views on life as you, but you've decided that doesn't matter because your selfless and you want to save lives when yours comes to an unfortunate end. I cannot begin to think of the pain your family will go through when you pass away, but you don't want mine to go through it either so you've offered to help. The thing I can't help thinking is that while I'm writing this your currently doing whatever you do in life, it's 11pm at night, there stands a good chance your in bed sleeping so you can get up tomorrow and go to work to fund the lifestyle you live, pay the rent or mortgage on the house you live in with your partner maybe, and possibly even your children. I wouldn't wish for anyone's life to be cut short, let alone it be cut short for me to live, but I've been told that isn't how it works. Unfortunately you passed away because it was your time to go, but you said that someone deserves the chance to live on with your lungs and I am that lucky person. When that call comes for me, your family will also receive a call or awful news. From your death will come my rebirth, it will be the chance I am waiting for to live my life with my girlfriend. And I will be eternally grateful for you for making thay choice to give me that chance! I don't know you, and I never will, but I'd like to say thank you, a great big massive thank you for the chance you've given me to live my life. Stranger I will never meet, thank you x