A LAW graduate has told how she fought back to chase her dreams after twice being left so ill she thought: “That’s it, I’m dead.”
Gaynor Goldie, 25, has spent time in a wheelchair after surgery for bowel disease Crohn’s and a battle with sepsis.
John KirkbyShe’s now chasing her dreams after completing her law degree from her hospital bed[/caption]
She developed sepsis after having life-changing operations
Gaynor had to learn how to walk again
Medics warned she may not survive but she defied the odds to land a job, her own home — and even finished her degree studies in a hospital bed.
Determined Gaynor, of Irvine, Ayrshire, said: “There were times I really thought that was it and I was dead.
“The doctors were preparing my family for the worst.
“But now it feels like my life is back on track.”
Gaynor was 17 when she was diagnosed with Crohn’s.
Two years later, she was on holiday in Dubai with parents Elissa, 56, and Graham, 61, when she fell seriously ill and had to abandon the trip.
She said: “It was so bad, I was convinced I was dying.
“I was screaming so much in the hotel room that staff had to come up and check what was happening.”
She underwent a colostomy — an operation on her bowel — and was fitted with a stoma bag.
But medication shut down Gaynor’s immune system and she developed potentially deadly sepsis.
She pulled through but ended up in a wheelchair after collapsing every time she tried to walk.
It turned out an infection had spread throughout her body and her large intestine had turned black.
Gaynor said: “I was only 22 but I was being written off.
“No one thought I would survive.
“The doctors didn’t think I was strong enough for surgery.
“But I was in so much pain that I was begging for it.”
She then had to learn how to walk again.
But Gaynor is now desperate to take the stigma out of Crohn’s.
She said: “My stoma bag is my party trick — it’s the first thing I tell people when I meet them.
“But I feel if I’m confident in myself, that helps put other people at ease.
“I don’t want this subject to be taboo.”
What is Crohn’s Disease?
CROHN’S disease is a long-term condition that causes inflammation of the lining of the digestive system.
Symptoms include diarrhoea, abdominal pain, fatigue and unintended weight loss plus blood and mucus in stools.
The illness is thought to affect some 26,000 Scots but its cause is not known.
Around one in five with Crohn’s — which is sometimes managed with steroids — have major surgery in the first five years.
John KirkbyShe is now trying to kick the stigma of Crohn’s Disease[/caption]
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