Six Month Update

January marked six months since I got my double lung transplant and I don't know about you but I feel like time has flown by! Although it feels like less as I was in hospital for two months then spent another month at home recovering and getting my bearings if you will. But I thought I'd do a little update on how life currently is!

First things first, physically I'm doing well. I had a bronch where they just had a little look at what's going on in my lungs and also a biopsy where they took a little piece of lung to test. All very routine, the bronch came back fine and I'll get the results of the biopsy next week. I'm also on a hella lot of less meds than I was, there's still a fair few tablets to take but I now just do two nebulisers a day when pre-transplant I would have to do at least seven. The very best bit is no more chest physio, this is just amazing. I would spend literally hours a day doing breathing exercises to clear crap out my lungs but still there would be more - it's like trying to get water out of a sinking ship with a hole in it, y'know? But since these newbies are all clean and clear I don't have to do that. To be free from physio is so incredible, it's all I've ever known so to experience life without needing to do it is like a dream come true.

This cutdown on meds and treatments does mean that I often feel like I've forgotten something, like not brushing my teeth or whatever. I've had this treatment regime since I was two years old so it's a massive thing to have it all change - it's just a bit surreal! Now I never cough, when I used to all the time. No more throwing up from coughing, no more fatigue, no more sticky feeling lungs. Instead I've joined a gym(!!!)

For the first time in my adult life I feel 'normal'. It's brilliant but if I'm to be honest with you it's also a little bit scary. In theory it's easy to say 'CF won't stop me!' and while a strong mentality is vital in getting through life with CF, the truth is no amount of positive energy is going to stop the fact that you can't bloody well breathe. It's not going to cut down the amount of time you spend doing treatments or the weeks spent in hospital attached to various drips. CF is a needy f*cker that demands to be heard at all times. Sometimes you can ignore it, often you can't and as a result you can miss out on life experiences that everyone else just takes for granted. Occasionally, especially as I got older, I did feel like I was missing out on life. The best way I can describe it is when I was end stage CF I felt a bit stuck on the riverbed watching everyone else swim along. They were all moving forward, I was not. But now I can join in and as excited as I am it's still nerve-wrecking because it's almost like leaving...I'd say 'comfort zone' but 'comfort' isn't the right word to describe end stage CF. I suppose my little bubble, if you like. So when I do fully join in properly I might not be swimming smoothly, I was worried I'd be a bit like up the creek without a paddle...but one thing I've noticed is that we're all just splashing about really, hoping for the best. And I think that that's the exciting thing about life, you never really know where it'll take you.

So I have plans, they may work out or they might just go up in flames but I feel so grateful that I'm even here to attempt these things I'm not as worried as I might be. All I know is I want to make the very most of this extra time and I hope that I can do my donor proud ♥

I'll leave you with some pics from the last few months, all fun memories I wouldn't have been able to make if it weren't for organ donation!