My 3 year transplant anniversary

Today marks 3 years since I received my transplant. 3 years ago I was in theatre about 1/2 way through my 12 hour transplant operation. So much has happened in 3 years, so in some ways it seems like a lot longer since my transplant, but also in some ways it feels like less than 3 years.

In the last 3 years I've:

• got my life back and been able to plan for my future
• gained independence and had to worry a lot less
  
• passed my GCSEs and completed a sixth form course
• become free of IV lines
• gained and then lost an illeostomy
• gone from TPN onto enteral feeds and then got off enteral feeds completely (but am back on temporarily at the moment)
• learnt to eat and built up my eating to reach an almost normal level of eating
• got my social life back
• travelled to Florida and Japan
• had energy and been able to go out again (temporarily on hold at the moment due to ME though)
• watched Lizzy's daughter M grow up. She was a just a baby of 6 months old when I had my transplant, now she's 3 and a half.
  
• done lots to promote organ donation
• met some amazing people in the transplant community
  
• enjoyed my life :D

As I've said previously I don't feel comfortable celebrating my transplant anniversary, so have just been having a thoughtful day today. I'm feeling very mixed emotions and have been thinking of my amazing donor family more than myself so far. I'm in touch with my donor's 2 sisters (J and C) via email, so emailed them both earlier letting them know they were in my thoughts today. I've not heard back from J yet, but C sent a lovely little reply within just a couple of minutes. And she said that she had passed my message onto her parents. I'm so grateful for my gift of life and words will never be enough to express how I feel.