Leaving Cert student speaks about life-saving transplant

THE Irish Kidney Association’s Organ Donor Awareness Week 2017 is taking place this week (April 1-8). The key focus of the campaign is to continue to remind the Irish public to have the important family discussion about their wishes concerning deceased organ donation and support the association by buying a 'forget-me-not' flower and other merchandise, while its volunteers distribute the organ donor cards.

To mark the week we'll be featuring the stories of some Mayo people who have benefited from organ donation, both online and in our print edition.

Here an inspirational young man, Matthew McNeive, tells us his story:

  

Before I received my kidney transplant in 2010, I was on dialysis four out of every six nights at home. This meant that every evening my mother connected me to a dialysis machine in my bedroom at 8 o'clock and there I stayed until 8 a.m. the following morning.

Everything I needed had to be handed to me and done for me for those 12 hours. I was on lots of medication, which left me tired, and I had very little energy.

That was over seven years ago. After my transplant I was advised not to play contact sports so I started playing table tennis. And more recently I started doing athletics.

Since then I have won All-Ireland and Connaught titles with my school (St. Louis in Kiltimagh) at table tennis. I won three medals at the European Transplant Games at both table tennis and athletics. I was voted The Connaught Telegraph male sports person of the year for 2016.

Last week I was recognised as one of 20 finalists at the Pramerica Spirit of Community awards for my commitment to organ donor awareness.

And all of this is thanks to a family somewhere in Ireland, who, in their grief, could see beyond themselves and their loss and gave the gift of life by allowing their loved ones organs to be donated.

I can never fully express my sincere gratitude to that family as I will never know them. They gave the gift of life to me, a complete stranger to them.

What I can do, however, is to continue to promote organ donor awareness and to encourage people, especially younger children and teenagers, to get involved with a sport. That will help them both mentally and physically. It is so important to keep positive and upbeat in adversity.

 

Organ Donor Cards can also be obtained by phoning the Irish Kidney Association LoCall 1890 543639 or Freetext the word DONOR to 50050. Visit the website www.ika.ie.

It is now possible to store an organ donor card, the ‘ecard’, on Smart mobile phones. Simply search for ‘Donor ECard’ at the iPhone Store or Android Market Place.