Getting signed with an agent

So approximately a year ago I decided I would like to get into tv presenting. Something that probably sounded very far fetched at the time. I even questioned myself. Was it asking to much to have all I have and wish for the dream career? Would it be simply to unobtainable with my health constraints! It's certainly a hard career to get into anyway let alone after having a double lung transplant, cystic fibrosis, diebeties, osteopenia and juvenile chorionic arthritis. These were all my thoughts before I had faced chronic rejection and had a second double lung transplant.

I did a piece with itv west-country which I presented myself, then shortly after my health started to decline.

With my second transplant my confidence was knocked and all idea of tv presenting seemed impossible. The on dec 30th 2013 myself and Katie gammon appeared on itv daybreak http://youtu.be/MUFAZMawqwk and with that the presenting dream was reignited and conversation in the green room led to what I hope will be my big chance! I was put in touch with a agent.

This agent represents many of the great tv presenters and faces I aspire to. Most of all Katie piper. Katie piper was burned by acid a attack and left disfigured and gravely injured. She proves to me that even through great adversity people can still achieve careers within media, that may seem beyond our grasps. Does a world of glamour and pretty people have room for chronic illness and disease?

So I have been in contact with the agent, who I'm being signed with. Firstly to start doing more public speaking, but paid work unlike all my public speaking so far. This means things like corporate events. After time it will lead to more media appearances and progressing to TV presenting. They also work at book deals, which the past month I have been thinking a lot about writing my story down properly, not as a blog but a novel. I feel like I've hit the jackpot and I'm extremely excited to start my career.

I'm also doing some work experience with itv West Country which has been on the back burner for some time now. It's in Paignton zoo filming a baby oragutan. I'm looking for lots of opportunities like this to get experience in tv. Just shadowing tv journalism, radio and presenters as this is the only way I can get my experience up and improve on my knowledge of the media world. I hope to specialise in health presenting and journalism drawing light to other people's illnesses and helping them with there campaigning just like so many have done for me.

Im aware iv been given a unique window of opportunity, it may shut at any time, but while it's open I'm going to make the most of it, does TV and media have a place for someone like me? Will my health become an obstacle? As I have been telling everyone if I fail because I didn't try, I don't deserve it, if I try and fail then it was never ment to be.

Is it ok to want more?

Living with cystic fibrosis I always thought as a child and teenager I would be ready to die when death came. That I would be tired of the fight for life and ready to role over and let death happen. How naive I was. Me and my best friend Lou were on our way back from London yesterday and while we were driving along we started to talk about my transplant, as I often do at the moment. It's my way of unpicking at the seems of life, rummaging through the memory's, deciphering the codes in my head left from the trauma of it all. Because when your told your dying, when your so poorly you can barely stay awake, your brain starts to loose pieces of information along the way. It's like it decides what it can deal with and starts to throw out all the other stuff until you are back on the road to recovery and then you start to find all these lost memory's.

Memory's such as ringing my nan and telling her I wasn't going to get a second transplant and I wasn't going to make it. Nothing can prepare you for that conversation, not even your delusions as a teen that when death came you would be ready. Starting to relive those memory's, it's so painful, so raw, it's like going through them for the first time because each time you remember something else and it's all new again, the pain slices through you and the tears sweep my face.

I can only just remember the howling cry of my brother, even as I write about it, it feels so fresh so new and I want to reach Into my memory and wrap my arms around him And tell him how it all turns out ok.

I still don't remember all those conversations I made to so many of my close friends and family that day. I wonder if they will ever come back, part of me hopes they will stay hidden. Am I ever ready to deal with these moments of pain. There are still things I cannot remember from my first transplant and i am sure if they were to come back to me they wouldn't benefit me in anyway, they are hidden some where in the deep fog of protection, possibly just dropped out of my brain forever never to be found.

There is something else I have learnt from this experience, not only am I not ready to die but I'm finally ready to live. Now this may sound confusing for everyone, iv never shied away from life or walked away from an experience to be had but iv never thought I wanted to live to be old, joked about the fact I don't want wrinkles and simply thought that 50, 60 or 80 sounds to old. Sorry for those who are that age, but being young those ages do sound so old to me. Until the penny dropped, stu said to me today about sorting out his retirement fund. My reaction was to well up, I want to be there! I want to be with him when he retires, sending him off down the golf club in the day while I natter away to my friend Lou and go to the spa or some retirement like leisurely thing!

This may sound selfish of me, it does to me. It sounds like I'm simply wanting to much and I should just be grateful for every day I get, god I promise you I am. Sometimes though I catch myself wanting more and hoping I never have to relive those conversations with my friends, not just in my memory's but in real life.


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Recovering

I have had a short break from my blog, so I apologise to those who have asked for updates. The reason for my break was to take time to heal, reflect and recover. Although I'm writing this it certainly doesn't mean I have finished that process, post transplant recovery take months, some say your not recovered physically for about a year, emotionally I guess everyone is different, but I don't know if we ever truly recover from near death experiences although they do get put to one side and for us to carry on life in the most 'normal' way possible. As I said in a previous blog before my chronic rejection set in I felt the most recovered and 'normal' as I would ever get. Now my goal is to get back to that and rushing emotional recovery isn't something I would ever do.

So where am i now? I am out of hospital I have been for a week and a day, it's been 4 weeks today since my transplant, 4 weeks since some stranger once again gave me the gift of life, 4 weeks and some where there is a family out there grieving, please think of them and wish them peace and my donor rest peacefully in heaven.

I am at my nans with my husband while I recover and we look for a house, our first house to buy. It's so exciting and at the same time scary, it's such a huge decision when looking at houses whether we are going to pick the right one for us. I can't tell you how happy I am that I have such a normal worry such as buying a house!

Physically I am weak, but no where near as weak as I was the first time, but still I have a way to go, I am walking lots and sometimes I forget to rest in between, my mind thinks I can just go back to how things were before, my body is in need of time, but I know we will get there.

Finally I just want to take a minute to thank you, thank all of you who have supported me, helped my hospital packs in the last few months which will be ready to go out for Christmas. I have been buying lots of fun crafty things and exciting goodies for them and it has provided me with much needed distraction from myself and my own situation. I want to thank everyone who had donated to the packs and to the fund which my friend set up for me personally, I have no Idea what I will spend that on, but I will put it to good use. I also want to thank all the lovely people who sent me cards, present and simple messages of encouragement. These message in those hours of darkness brightened my day and on good days widened my smile. Simple things have such a great effect and I cannot thank everyone enough.


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National transplant week

I know for those of you out there waiting for transplant, or perhaps considering being listed for one my previous post may have been some what scary. I'm not going to lie, it is scary, but iv always been an honest blogger, someone who shares the highs and the lows, because surely without the lowest of moments we cannot see how high the next peak is? Also I believe the truth however scary it may be can only leave you informed and ready right? Ad I hope those of you who read my blog are prepared for every truth, otherwise you may be on the wrong page.

So where am I going with this, well it's national transplant week, this week also marks my transplant anniversary. 2 years ago, I was dying, kept alive on the most invasive horrendous machines, my call came in what was the last hour of my life for sure. Thanks to the generosity, kindness and courage of a family I do not know and person I will never meet. This week I will mourn my donor, I will celebrate them, I will be thankful for every little precious moment they have allowed me and I will pray for there family because I know they lost there loved one this week 2 years ago. I do this every day but this week I'm not going to shut up about how grateful and lucky I am and how I believe giving the gift of life is the best gift you can give.

So although for me this time is hard at the moment with chronic rejection, my lung collapse and a chest infection, I want you all remember how amazing these last 2 years have been for me, how I have achieved to me things I never thought possible e.g cycling 180 miles, raising lots of money for charity, meeting new people, going on my honey moon, sharing a 1st & a 2nd wedding anniversary with my husband, reaching 23, working at next. Some of these things are so simple, so normal, but to me they were like a dream elusive and unreal, until I went out and I did them. I did them because of my donor and I will carry on doing and achieving to me what were impossible dreams and something's that are even to big for me to dream.

So please think about giving someone the gift of life, think about it, talk about, do something about it. Sign up today.

https://www.organdonation.nhs.uk/how_to_become_a_donor/registration/consent.asp



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2 year wedding anniversary

On Sunday me and stu celebrated our 2 year wedding anniversary. We stayed in a lovely hotel over night in Bristol and had a nice meal together. I'm grateful for every moment I have with my hubby but special occasions like this we think back to when we got married and how close we came to losing each other. The reason I got to this anniversary was due to the kindness of a stranger and there loved ones. So with every breath I thank them and on these special occasions I always say a special thanks. Sometimes I look back over these last 2 years and they seem like a dream, almost to good to be true, did it all really happen?





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Felix cane

I'm not one to follow celebrities, to idolise or be star struck. I admire certain people and think what they've done with the careers is notable but it wouldn't have me weak at the knees. Only one person has ever made me do that and I met her when she came to visit me in hospital. Felix cane. Your probably thinking who? Unless your interested in fitness pole dancing her name isn't greatly known in the wider world, but let me assure you it should be!

I'de had a bronch that morning and just felt ready to take 02 off, in my pjs, no make up and to be honest I couldn't have cared, if I had known my idol was going to walk in then well I might have made more of a effort. My friend Sam Ames from Taylor's retreat was hosting Felix workshops the whole month and I had already expressed how upset I was that I was not well enough to go or to meet her. Shes from australia and travels the world so its not every day you get the chance. Sam walked in on her own which was a nice enough surprise anyway, she gave me a card expressing that Felix was sad we couldn't meet, next thing Felix is there in front if me! I then did the geeky thing, started crying and breathing stupidly! In fact I had to put my 02 back on I was that bad.

I then proceeded to spent a couple of amazing hours chatting with Felix and Sam, in some surreal world. It was crazy.

I'd like to explain why Felix is my idol. She is a world champ at pole, cirque due Soleil performer, you can't even imagine the things she can do on a pole, the strength, grace, skill and beauty of it is something unimaginable. It is something that my whole 6 years poling has inspired me to the core and since meeting her has inspired me to recover so I can train hard and possible achieve one eight of what she does. I really can't describe what her visit did for me and what a huge moral boost it was.

So here's a few pictures of my time with the extremly funny, witty and strangely down to earth women.




















Just a quick health update, I am home and have a consultation in London for the fundo operation Wednesday, I had a bronch last Tuesday which showed I have something called organised pneumonia, it's a inflammatory response that collapses the airways, I'm on 6 weeks treatment of high dose steroids for this, in which I will eat everything in site and become fat and bloated. I don't know if my lungs will recover and I don't know when the operation will be, I may have to wait to the end of this treatment as steroids affect healing. I am still extremely positive but unfortunately also extremely breathless. I guess I didn't really want to do a full update on health as I'm just trying to focus on one thing at a time and not worry about the operation or if ill get any better, I just want to think about trying to getting better.

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Disney Paris

Well I had clinic on Thursday, previously I was told to wait and see about a holiday and that I possibly couldn't go until September as I'm sure most of you know, me and Stu didn't really get a honey moon, so to speak. We spend a few nights in Cornwall and it was a very grand hotel but dying on your 'honey moon' isn't much fun. So we were hoping to do away for a 2 week break on our first wedding anniversary. Which is next week 16th of June. I decided to see if we could go away for 4 days to Paris or Spain. I was desperate to get away and would just love to go anywhere for a short amount of time. I got the go ahead. We have just booked Disney Paris for 3 days!! I'm so excited I can't believe it, I can't even begin to tell everyone how excited I am, I went into the travel agents today and it just came out to expensive for us £1700+ but I got on the Internet tonight and have sorted out a deal that's less than half that!!! Still the most expensive 3 days of my life but for once when you've got to do something you've just got to do it and we have. I feel so highly emotional and grateful, I'm living and enjoying my life doing the things I've wanted to do, Holidays were such a big part of what I wanted to be able to do post TX, Just to enjoy every second and soak up all that life has to offer. I'm so grateful I feel like I could burst. So on the 16th we fly to paris and stay at the best disney hotel and go to the disney parks!

I'm going to leave it there, a short but sweet post.