Tuesday 10 November 2009

New Start... New Blog...

Ok... so a bit of a reflective blog...

Its been a whole year since my transplant (this time last year I was still in hospital recovering)... If you have been following this blog for a long time you will have read about my ups, downs, triumphs and TEARS!

You will have read about my struggles with dialysis, life at university, my amazing family, my campaigning and of course my journey to transplant!

However I feel the blog URL http://lifeondialysis--waitingforthecall.blogspot.com/ isn't appropriate anymore! I will always remember my time one dialysis and my time waiting for the call but it just doesn't fit with where I am in my life right now...

So its time for a change.... I have a new URL a new look... so why not pop on over to my brand spanking NEW BLOG!

It will still have all my old postings so you will still be able to look back at them....

Wednesday 4 November 2009

A big week...

It is a busy week ahead... tomorrow I GRADUATE! I can't believe how quick it has come around... in fact I can't believe that I have finished my 3 years at uni! I may have to now grow up a bit!
I've had some lovely presents and cards and even got a cake off my Mum and Dad! You can see pics of them here.

The of course on Saturday it is the Live Life Then Give Life Abseil... me and 42 others (a few people have dropped out) will be abseiling down the 100ft Leasowe Lighthouse! There is still time to sponsor by clicking here! Thanks so much to all those that have sponsored already, I'm so pleased I am able to give something back to the charity that have helped me so much!

So going back in time...
Yesterday was a busy day! I went to get my hair cut (got a really short bob) and coloured (I've gone a really dark dark brown, on the advice of mum not to have red hair on my grad photos!)

I then came home and went to the gym, I think the session went well... I passed on the ball this time as my stomach was still hurting from Sunday!

So I did 20minutes on the treadmill on a higher speed setting, 3 of these minutes were jogging!
I did 20 minutes on the bike and cycled 4.5km.
I did 4 laps of the 200m track walking and 1 lap jogging.

I then went out for a couple of drinks in town with a few of my mates, I was originally not going to have a late one, but I only came in at 2.30am this morning so later than I anticipated!

I also had phone calls from the press office at the Royal Liverpool Hospital who want to do a story about me to coincide with the launch of the campaign, to hopefully appear in the Liverpool Echo in the next few weeks. The Manchester Evening News also contacted me but regarding doing a story about me graduating so that will be in the paper sometime this week!

I think thats about it for now! Wish me luck for tomorrow, I hope I don't trip up on stage.....!!!

Monday 2 November 2009

The new campaign...

I was going to write about Save Jess-tival but check out the Live Life Then Give Life blog... as it is a great write up! Everyone had a fab night and all the volunteers did a fab job in making it run so smoothly, the acts all went down well and I had the chance to catch up with the Nick and Mike from The Yeah You's afterwards which was fab, they are so down to earth and signed their album for me! There is also a mini write up here from the guys at Battlefront!

Anyway back to today... firstly, my stomach is soooo sore today, its from all those sit ups on the ball yesterday!

Today is the launch of the new NHSBT campaign...

New research reveals the gap between what we would take and what we are prepared to give. While 96% of us would accept an organ if we needed one, only 27% of us have the joined the NHS Organ Donor Register (ODR).

Many of us (45%) have the best intentions to sign up to the ODR and commit to donate our organs for transplantation after our death, but just haven’t got round to it.
While some people are still unclear about how to register, a significant proportion of us (17%) are ready to act now. A further 19% need to involve their family in the decision. Research also shows a disparity between those who think they’ve already signed up to be an organ donor – 35% as compared with the actual figure of 27% (16.5 million) on the ODR.

The campaign aims to increase significantly the number of people on the ODR, asking what we would do if someone we love needed an organ: if we would accept an organ, shouldn’t we be prepared to give one?

Welcoming the campaign, Health Secretary Andy Burnham said: "Each year, organ donors transform the lives of thousands of people. But despite this, three people die every day while waiting for a transplant. More people are signing up to the Organ Donor Register than ever before, but many more are needed.

"Most of us support organ donation and the overwhelming majority would take an organ if we needed it. I would urge everybody who supports organ donation to show it by signing up to the Organ Donor Register and discussing their wishes with their families."

You may spot TV adverts, hear radio adverts or see it in the press... lets hope all this gets people talking! If you haven't done so already... check out the new website to encourage people to sign up. It is very hard hitting but I think it is what people need to see, this is reality and it is happening to 10,000 people out there RIGHT NOW, and we can all do something about it... people are needlessly dying and we can do something to stop it by Signing up to the Organ donor Register!

I tried to get this message across on a tv interview I did today for Channel M (a Manchester TV Station)... You can watch my interview if you follow that link. The new NHSBT advert was shown during the interview... you can see it by clicking here. It depicts a young man with Cystic Fibrosis detriorating in front of his mum while they are watching tele.

Lets hope the hard hitting nature of it will push people into acting....

Sunday 1 November 2009

Just got back from the gym and I am really pleased with what I was able to do...

I did:

10 minutes rowing
3 minutes on the bike
25 sit ups on a big inflatable ball
20 reps on a weight thing for my legs
1 minute on a machine similar to a cross trainer (but hurts 10 times more) I will NOT be going on this one again at least not until I am much fitter and can handle it!
20 minutes on the treadmill on a little bit of an incline (with around 2 minutes jogging)
15 minutes on the bike
Once round the 200 metre track!

In other News, NHSBT are launching a new campaign tomorrow, can't really tell you much more about it today but I can say that it will be in the news/media tomorrow! Check out www.savethetinman.com to get an idea of what its going to be about... I will update in the next couple of days on how its all going, I will be doing a couple of radio interviews for BBC Radio 1Xtra and filming for a channel on Sky called Channel M (from Manchester)!

Bye for now....