Girl who had signed up for Dignitas saved by transplant
‘Maybe tomorrow will be better’
LEFT housebound and reliant on oxygen by a worsening lung condition, Janka Penther could see no happy future.
No longer able to do surfing and other sports she had loved, the cystic fibrosis sufferer contemplated suicide and even signed up to the Dignitas clinic.
But then she was persuaded to have a double lung transplant – and now her life has been transformed. Miss Penther, 35, from Witney, Oxfordshire, confounded medical experts by completing a gruelling 20-mile, 200-obstacle assault course.
Yesterday the restaurant worker, who had the operation four years ago, said she hoped to inspire others with life-limiting conditions. ‘I want to move the boundaries,’ she said.
‘I want to show other CF patients that you can overcome your difficulties. At 15, if I’d seen people like me now, I would not have considered suicide. But I didn’t have any idea of what life after transplant would be like.’
German-born Miss Penther was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis – a genetic condition that causes the lungs to become clogged with mucus – as a baby. Doctors warned her parents that she might not live to see her second birthday.
As she grew up, she vowed to live as active a life as possible, playing her favourite sports at school and then taking up surfing when she moved to Cornwall as a teenager. However a series of illnesses including flu and pneumonia left her incapable of leaving the house and dependent on oxygen.
‘It was like breathing through a straw that’s half-covered,’ she said. ‘You start to think, “If I walk somewhere, can I make it back?”. In the meantime my friends were off getting married and starting families.’
Miss Penther was initially against a transplant, fearing it would make her more dependent on others, so she paid to join Dignitas, the Swiss assisted suicide organisation.
‘I spoke to everyone about it, and while my mum found it hard my dad said, “Yes, when the time comes, you can come to me and I’ll help”.’ But she changed her mind and had the transplant because ‘as a surfer, I made it my mission to catch one more wave’.
‘All I could think was, “If I don’t get these lungs, I’m suffering for nothing”. There were days when I just couldn’t face living,’ she said. ‘But then a little voice inside my head would say, “Maybe, just maybe, tomorrow will be better”.’
Miss Penther had the eighthour operation at Harefield Hospital in West London in 2013, using the lungs of a 23-year-old woman. Within 24 hours, she was out of intensive care and breathing on her own.
Weeks later she was enjoying walks on the beach and by the following year was rambling in the Scottish highlands and surfing again. Her first 5km run came a year to the day after her transplant.
Last month she took on her biggest challenge so far, the Rat Race Dirty Weekend at Burghley House in Lincolnshire.
Athletes negotiate 200 obstacles including water crossings, monkey bars, 8ft walls and giant slides in what is billed as the world’s toughest assault course.
Miss Penther, who is team manager of the Harefield Transplant Club, completed the course in eight hours.
‘ There were times when I wanted to give up – but it was awesome to finish,’ she said, adding that with every breath she thought about the anonymous donor whose lungs she was given. Next week she will swim at the World Transplant Games in Malaga.
She added: ‘Unfortunately I’m still on borrowed time due to my illness but my message is this: Grab life by the horns and dare to do things.’