BBC News, Leicester
“It’s like we’ve got a second chance, and we’re taking every opportunity,” Catherine Canning says.
In 2008, her husband John was diagnosed with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) – a lung disease – and he said he had to rely on oxygen 24 hours a day and would get out of breath even when walking short distances.
The 66-year-old used to go ballroom dancing on a weekly basis with Catherine, but had to stop when his condition deteriorated around the time of the Covid pandemic.
John eventually had a double lung transplant in April 2023, which meant the couple, from Leicestershire, can dance together again, and they have a cruise of the Mediterranean booked this year.
When asked about their first dance together after the transplant, Catherine, 60, said: “It was the best feeling, but it was also the thought that somebody else had given John that chance as well.
“I got the biggest grin on my face. I was crying.
“We were with a brilliant group of friends who have supported us an awful lot throughout this, as well as our family who have been brilliant, but these group of friends are like the family we’ve chosen.
“There wasn’t a dry eye in the house, so I was crying and laughing and smiling. And I went wrong – even though it was a simple dance.
“It was just unbelievable, because I never thought I’d be back dancing with him again.”
John, who lives with his wife in Barrow-upon-Soar, had lung volume reduction surgery in 2020, which did not work, meaning he was recommended for a transplant.
He was told it could take him up to a year to find a donor when he was added to the transplant list in February 2023.
But just over four weeks later, he received a call to say doctors had found lungs for him.
Despite it emerging that one of the lungs contained an infection that could not be removed, another pair was found a week later.
The family travelled to the Royal Papworth Hospital in Cambridge, where John had the operation.
Catherine said: “Having said goodbye to him in the lift at the hospital as he went for the operation, I got down on the ground floor of the hospital with my son and just burst into tears.
“My son was with me, and he was brilliant, and as John’s always said, it’s probably more difficult for me than it ever was for him, going through the operation.”
After his surgery, John said he could notice an improvement as soon as he woke up after spending 10 hours on the operating table.
He said: “I’m not limited to oxygen tanks and walking for a few minutes without getting breathless.”
Last year, he walked 3.1 miles (5km) at Nottingham’s Harvey Hadden Stadium as part of the British Transplant Games, which he described as “emotional”.
On 20 January, or Blue Monday – dubbed by some as the most depressing day of the year – the couple sent a voice note to BBC Radio Leicester, when listeners were asked what they had to be cheerful about.
The note said they would celebrate their 40th wedding anniversary this year, and had booked a Mediterranean cruise just a few weeks after John came out of hospital.
Catherine said it came “completely out of the blue” when she was subsequently contacted by the BBC to elaborate on her story.
The pair have also urged people to talk to their loved ones about their wishes to donate organs after death.
They said: “Each year, hundreds of opportunities for transplants are missed because families aren’t sure what to do.
“Two minutes to register your decision to become an organ donor, and you could save up to nine lives.”
