Take it back exactly a year. Little me was sat in a hospital bed on the CF unit at frimley park, on ivs, with oxygen on wishing I was out celebrating the new year in like others my age! I feel very lucky to be sat at home now a year on, oxygen free and breathing without a struggle, without even thinking of breathing!
I spent yesterday reading over my blogs for the past year and it left me in tears to be honest, ESP the ones my mum wrote!
It's amazing how quickly your life can change and what you have had to deal with for so many years becomes a distant memory!
I also see many friends on my Facebook dealing with this time of the year struggle, colds and flus and many hit with nasty infections that leave them weaker, in hospital, fighting for their lives and I feel helpless and feel the need to want to be able to do more, but it's simply out of my control! Many waiting on the transplant list, hoping that magically life saving call comes any time now, so they can experience the feeling I have now, and can start the new year with a new life ahead of them!
Since coming out of hospital I feel like a hyperactive child on a sugar rush! Being sad just doesn't enter my head! I'm embracing every minute of life and making sure that whenever it's my time to go, I know I will have gone out with a bang! ( not that I can ever see myself actually dying) ha but This last 24 hours I have been flooded with emotions. I literally sat here crying early just because I'm so happy to be here!
This is ridiculously soppy and pathetic and I am back to my "man up" George mode now!
I can't quite get my head around this year, it only feels like yesterday it was last Xmas and we had just celebrated my cousins wedding!
I've had...
-Flare up of aspergillosis.
-swelling up due to the narrowing of the main vein to my heart.
-Having port removed which was meant to be a 10 minute produce awake, ended up being two hours, being put to sleep and the port falling apart once being removed!
- Having a balloon thing to open up the vein which didn't last at all!
-Spent my birthday in hospital!
-To having a new port fitted and stent placed to keep the vein open.
-To the stent falling into my heart!
-sent off to Harefield to remove the stent
-which they couldn't remove or get me off ventilator
-left ventilated in icu for 3 days
-wasn't allowed to leave Harefield
-left with a dodgy heart valve
-clots around the stent
-shit lungs
-3 false alarms
-1 double lung transplant, open heart surgery to remove stent, plus port removed again!
-blocked bowels
-complete muscle waste
-lost my voice
So apart from still having a dodgy heart valve that doesn't close properly, and swelling still happens, all is fixed and is amazing!
This year I'm setting myself goals! And I hope that this time next year I can look back and be proud that il have hopefully achieved most of them!! There not all crazy goals just ones that mean something to me!
1. I want to help others! - I have been very overwhelmed and lucky by the support shown to me and my family this year and now that I am able to, I want to give back and help others in anyway I can, even if it's something small!
2. I want to continue to raise awareness for the CF Trust and most importantly Organ Donation!!
3. I want to challenge myself! I really want to do an abseil down Guildford cathedral for charity! Not sure how to go about this but I'm on a mission to make this possible, plus I'm shit scared of heights haha
4. I want to go to go ape!!
5. Do an indoor sky dive!! (Don't want to risk my life with a real one) haha
6. Gravity force has to be done!!
7. Throw the best 1 year lung anniversary Ball in August and raise shit loads of money for charity!
8. Challenge myself to Great Strides 65 on the 11th June in Surrey! 40 miles walk for the CF Trust!
9. Get a job and get mega fit and healthy!
10. And spend quality time with lee and Mason and travel around England and visit places I've never even heard of!
These are just a few, but I'm sure I will get up to more mischief as the year goes on!
This year has been the worse year of my life, but on the flip side the absolutely amazing year! I never thought it was possible to be able to breathe like this! I was far too young to remember what "healthy" lungs felt like, well Infact I've never had healthy lungs so this is a whole new experience and one I'm going to absolutely smash at!
I'm so grateful to my incredible lee, mum, dad, sisters, aunties, uncles, cousins, and in laws who never gave up on me this year! To my friends who went out of there way to help and support me, even when I wasn't aware of what was going on! And 1 even flew back from the other side of the world to be near!!
The the generosity of total strangers offering help and support!! To everyone who donated to my just giving page which I only intended to make £1000 at the start and is now over £13,000!!!! Plus more to add from charity night I held..(will put that on here in a bit)
I've met some incredible people throughout this journey, I have the best team at Harefield and the best surgeon who continues to help!
My Frimley lot who I miss not seeing all the time now, took me under their wing and I can honestly say without ALL of them I wouldn't have got this far!
So that's all the soppy stuff done, now for my catch bits!!
So catch up of my December!! So we had the fantastic charity night screening of spectre at pinewood studios!! It's was such a good turn and out and raised over £2000 for the CF Trust which I'm pleased with!
Also visited my family up north for a little Xmas party! Which was lovely, my sister and I got a little too drunk!! But we had fun bonding! Haha
And my cousins little one Amelie made us all have stick on tattoos!
I've celebrated my friends birthday!
Had a lovely Xmas afternoon tea at oaklands park hotel in weybridge with my girlees!
Got my little fur baby Mason the cutest Xmas outfits -he's not so keen!
I ACTUALLY put the tree up and all the decorations this year! Whilst blasting out Xmas songs and dancing around the room like a nuttah winding lee up!
Had a lovely Xmas with the families! Didn't get pics of us all together like last year, it was packed in the pub!
He hates getting photographed!
So Boxing Day lee and I decided to take mason down to west wittering for a nice walk along the beach! It was the perfect weather for it and actually quite warm for Xmas!
Mason experienced his first swimming lesson, the stupid dog was running against another dog and misjudged the "puddle" as the tide was coming in and ran straight into the water, tumbled and then learnt how to swim very quickly!
Was a very funny moment and everyone was laughing bless him! I did panic thinking I would have to go in and safe him as he's never swam before but the boy did well!! Proud mummy moment!
Oh and I crashed my car! Well actually I didn't, a motorbike crashed into me as I was pulling out of a garage! He was over taking traffic and was going way to fast! Scarest moment of my life! I thought he was dead!! I've never experienced shock like that before!! I'm always so aware of bikes and always let them go and overtake me if there's space, my dad had a bike for years and I use to regularly ride on the back with him! But this guy came out of nowhere and should have checked! Now I don't have my car as its getting fixed and had to spend out! It's bollocks ESP when it's not your fault! Thankfully he walked away in injured which is most inportant thing no matter what the situation! But he didn't talk to me! Haha
So as much as I moaned about my Kia Sportage I actually miss it a lot at the moment!!
I got very spoilt for Xmas sponsored by Tiffany and Pandora! But one of my fav pressy has got to me my Fitbit! You can track how many steps you do a day, your activity, your sleep, your calories and how much you burn etc! It's so good and gives u a push if your having a lazy day!
So I end this year on a high and hope that 2016 continues as good as this one has ended!
Mucho loveo!!
And happy new year!
XXXX
