A 12-year-old girl was waiting for a heart at the same time as me. I was lucky, she wasn’t ...that is so unfair
LEGENDARY COMEDIAN BACKS OUR DONOR CAMPAIGN
I AM backing the Daily Mirror’s Change the Law for Life campaign because I know what it is like waiting for a heart transplant.
You know there is a shortage of donor organs, so you never really believe you are going to get the heart you need. You think you are going to fade away.
I was so lucky to get the heart I needed 15 years ago, but not everyone does.
I’ll never forget swapping letters with a 12-year-old girl who was on the waiting list at the same time as me.
Time was running out for her, but I was so impressed by her letters, they were so lovely and so mature.
They were probably far more mature than mine – I just bombarded her with jokes I thought a 12-year-old might find funny. I wanted to keep her spirits up rather than exchanging stories about how much we were struggling.
We only swapped a few letters but we got on so well I told her I would take her out for a curry after her transplant. She was delighted, but she said: “I have to warn you, I don’t like them too spicy.” That made me smile.
After I wrote to her a couple of times I got the phone call I had been waiting for – they had a new heart for me and I was rushed into hospital for the transplant.
A couple of weeks after my transplant, before I’d even left hospital, I got the most awful news.
So few children die that there simply aren’t enough suitable organs available. That little girl had been waiting too long and her time ran out.
The doctors did the best they could. They were so desperate they tried to piggy-back a five-year-old’s heart on to hers, but it didn’t work.
I was devastated when I heard she had died. I’d already had a good innings, but her life was just beginning. She was such a great little girl, it was so unfair.
That is why I am so passionate about the opt-out donor register. I hate to see children suffering and a lot of those children on the transplant waiting list are suffering unnecessarily.
If more people agreed to donate their organs – or the organs of a loved one – when they die, these children wouldn’t be suffering and dying on the waiting list.
It’s a huge decision for any family, but they are giving someone the chance to live. No one could give a greater gift.
I was first diagnosed with heart failure in 1992, not long after my television show with my old pal Syd Little was cancelled.
The doctors told me it was a smoker’s disease. I’ve never smoked it my life, it was all the years I spent bouncing around the stage in smoky clubs.
By 2000 my heart was beating so slowly it wasn’t pumping enough blood my body and I was retaining so much water I was drowning from within.
When they put me on water tablets I lost 14lbs in two nights and my wedding ring fell off my finger.
Yet I was still touring with Syd. When I was on stage I was able to perform like a man half my age – they call it doctor theatre. As soon as I came off I could barely breathe, let alone speak. I had to be guided back to our caravan for the night and I would collapse, exhausted.
When we finished that tour we went straight to Hull for the pantomime. I’ve never been so bad in my life. Our roadie had to drive right up to the theatre door and help me out.
It was three steps to the door, one, two, three, then I had to sit and rest on a little chair by the stage door.
Even putting on my seatbelt in the car was a huge effort. I had to sit there for a
minute afterwards, just to get my breath back. It was a nightmare.
The doctor told me I had to give up work or I could drop dead on stage and I reluctantly agreed.
Telling Syd our partnership was over was the most painful phone call I’d ever had to make. I was crying my eyes out.
We’d been mates for over 50 years, now I was putting him out of a job because I was too sick to work. I felt terrible. The doctors put me on the transplant list and gave me a pager they would call when they found a heart. To start with I was too terrified to leave the house, just in case they called.
After two months they called while we were driving up the motorway to Manchester, taking my son to university.
They had a heart, but the operation was cancelled with 20 minutes to go because there was a problem with the left ventricle. By the time I had my transplant in June, 2003, I was in such a mess I knew I couldn’t carry on without it. The benefit was immediate. I was in the gym the next day. It felt fantastic. For the first time in years I could breathe properly and walk 10 yards without having to sit down. Writing to my donor’s family was much harder than writing to that lovely little girl who became my pen pal. It was so difficult to express how grateful I was I re-wrote it 20 times. I told them it hadn’t just saved my life, it changed it. My granddaughters had only ever seen me slumped in a chair, struggling to breathe, now I could go into the garden and play with them.
Other people on the waiting list deserve the second chance that I got.
We shouldn’t accept people dying because of a shortage of donor organs. We should do everything to make sure there are enough organs to save everyone who needs one.
On Friday MPs have the chance to do just that. I hope they take it.