Seasiders team up with local fan Michelle Mitchell to raise awareness about organ donation
On Saturday 29th September at the Seasiders v Grays Athletic FA Trophy game, Michelle Mitchell will be helping the club to raise awareness about organ donation. There will be a stand at the club on the day for people to get information and to talk to her about registering to become a donor.
You can see Michelle talking to Seasiders TV in 3 parts to be released on
Sunday 23rd September, Tuesday 25th September and Thursday 27th September, all leading up to the awareness-raising day.
Give them a watch and read on below to find out about her inspiring story.
Michelle Mitchell is a local girl. Her garden backs onto the ground and she and her husband, Mitch, follow Felixstowe and Walton.
Five years ago, her life was turned upside down when she suddenly felt unwell at the end of a regular run around Felixstowe. She had always been fit and healthy, was a keen runner and had even competed twice in the London Marathon. After various tests, it became clear that the problem was her liver, which was gradually shutting down her body; she needed a transplant. She admitted that, ‘When it’s happening to you, you don’t realize how ill you are,’ but within a few months of being diagnosed, her weight had fallen to under 5 stone and she was unable to walk up the stairs at home.A phone call from Addenbrooke’s hospital late one night to say that they had a possible match for a liver came just in time. Michelle was to find out after surgery that she may only have had another month to live.
So, in the Summer of 2014, having been matched with a donor, she underwent liver transplant surgery. She recalls that the surgeon, Paul Gibbs, spoke to her just before she went into theatre and asked her what she wanted to achieve with the transplant. Her reply was what many of us would probably say: ‘…spend some time with my family…go out for a nice meal …even go back to work!’ But he pushed her beyond these ‘normal’ wishes to find out what she really wanted. And she admitted, ‘I want to run. I want to get back to full fitness again.’ He told her that there was no reason not to achieve that. Michelle believed him and took that belief with her in her recovery from the transplant. Around 3 months after the surgery, she put on her running shoes again and did a gentle walk-run of about a mile. That first outing was ‘amazing’, according to Michelle and the beginning of what has been a long and determined process to get back to the fitness she once had.
That determination certainly paid off: in August 2015, a year after surgery, Michelle ran for Addenbrooke’s in the British Hospital Transplant Games held in Newcastle, winning gold in the 100m and 200m races. The following year she added 400m to her repertoire and won three golds and was selected for the World Transplant Games. She competed in Malaga in 2017 and came home with a bronze, two silvers and a gold. ‘It’s taken years to get to the stage where I am now,’ she tells us, but she has achieved something post-transplant which she had dreamt of since she was a teenager: to represent her country in athletics.
Her running and positive attitude is Michelle’s way of showing support for the wonderful transplant team at Addenbrooke’s and she continues to be an ambassador for the hospital and the charity, ACT, that supports it. Although she was on the donor list, she says she hadn’t given organ donation much thought before her illness ‘because you never think it’s going to happen to you.’ Now, she is out there handing out leaflets and drumming up support wherever she can.
Her proximity to and fondness for the club have led our paths to cross and now, Felixstowe and Walton are joining with her to spread the word that little bit further. Michelle will be at our home game on Saturday 29th September against Grays Athletic in the FA Trophy, when the club will be having its first organ donation awareness day. There will be information about becoming a donor and the chance to talk to Michelle first-hand.
Nobody will be asked for either money or time. This campaign will be designed to achieve one simple task, that of making sure people are aware of the issues around applying for and carrying donor cards and increasing the chance of being able to re-tell more amazing stories like Michelle’s.
