Diana gears up for fifth world transplant games
DIANA Higman says she will take a break from competing at international level after attending her fifth World Transplant Games this weekend.
And why not? Since receiving a new liver in 2008, the Derby woman has attended each of the biannual events and this will be her first on home shores.
An accomplished cyclist, 56-yearold Higman has won five gold medals, a bronze medal and a silver medal at World Transplant Games in Sweden, South Africa, Malaga and Argentina.
“It’s in Houston, Texas in 2021 and I won’t be going – I’ll have a couple of years off,” said Higman.
“I think I’ve had a good run at it, doing 10 years. I have three daughters and I have to make time for them, too.
“I think cycling and competing has saved my life, really. After my transplants, I thought that was it.”
Like most people with transplants who make a point of being active after their operations, Higman sees every day as a bonus and never fails to remember the donor who gave her a second chance, in her case a 62-year-old woman called Helen, from Scotland, whose liver gave her a second chance after she was given three days to live due to autoimmune hepatitis, which shrank her liver.
Competing and winning in sport has been the icing on the cake and she has been thrilled to see the World Transplant Games grow with each successive competition.
“When I started, there were two women in the cycling but it’s grown and grown,” she said.
“In Newcastle, 60 countries will be represented and 2,000 of us will be competing.
“It always feels like a big family and the medals are a bonus because, of course, all 2,000 of us know that we wouldn’t be here without our organ donations.”
Higman has been training on an approximate 10-kilometre circuit around Little Eaton and Coxbench ready for the 10km and individual time trial and a 20km team time trial in which she will team up with Zoe Dixon, from Manchester.
There will also be a 30km road race on a circuit, probably without the distractions of roadworks and traffic lights presented by Derby area roads.
Two other Derbyshire athletes will be taking part in Newcastle.
Dave Fisher, from Milford, received a kidney transplant in September, 2015, and will be taking on freestyle swimming, volleyball, table tennis and tenpin bowling at the games.
Simon Elmore, from Belper, is doing volleyball, tenpin bowling, table tennis and football and will be captaining the teams in the first two of those.
He has been to the World Transplant Games in Argentina and Spain, winning gold medals at each, but only after overcoming a long ordeal since kidney failure at the age of 33 a decade ago.
He later suffered a stroke at 37 and was diagnosed with a hole in the heart.
He “died” twice on the operating table when that was being fixed and finally received a new kidney in 2015. It has left him determined to promote organ donation.
“I have passion to help others and encourage them to understand there is hope even when you want to give up,” he said.
“I cannot put into words the amazing change physically I have. My donor and family have given me the chance to live again and, at my first games, the British Transplant Games, in 2015, it was an incredible feeling to be around so many people that all had that one thing in common, a donated organ.”
In April, Elmore was appointed Transplant Sport Kids and Teens Coordinator for the UK.