Iain's Story

In 2013 Iain was admitted to hospital with peritonitis, which is an infection of the inner lining of your tummy. While this was being investigated it was discovered that the cause of this was cirrhosis, which is scarring of the liver caused by long-term liver damage. The scar tissue then prevents the liver from working properly. Iain was treated in hospital for several months and was then urgently referred for a liver transplant.

In April, Iain had his initial assessment for the transplant and was approved to join the waiting list in early May. During this time Iain was taken off the list due to being severely unwell and not well enough to survive the operation. The incredible staff at St James Hospital stabilised Iain and he finally received his life-saving liver transplant on the 19th May 2014.

"Immediately after my transplant I was scared of everything. I had been ill for so long that the simple things seemed daunting – the top of the stairs in my own house seemed very high and precarious at first. With time though I started to accept life but was still very careful in how I mixed, what I ate - my transplant dominated everything.”

During his time in hospital recovering from his transplant, Iain’s brother was able to visit him from Australia and one of the activities they used to do was laps of the ward. On one of the walls of the ward contained a frame with two medals inside from the British Transplant Games and Iain’s brother said to him, “You should get some of those for yourself.”

Iain spoke to us about how the Leeds Transplant Adult Team has made such a positive impact on his life:

“The team gave me my life back when everything was so strange and new. I was a year post-transplant when I first met the team and was instantly made to feel welcome and supported.

My transplant dominated everything but that all changed within moments of arriving at my first Transplant Games. Seeing hundreds of other recipients living normal lives and enjoying doing all the things everyone else does made me re-evaluate my own approach.”

"Of course, all of that is only possible because of my donor. I often ponder someone that I’ll never meet but who is linked to me more intimately than even the closest person. She gave my children their dad back and my long suffering wife the life she deserved, rather than both remembering me as an angry, ill skeleton of a man"