A FORMER Huddersfield lifeguard who has been given a second chance at life is urging people to become organ donors.

Louise Taylor suffers from cystic fibrosis and became so ill she feared she would not live to see her 30th birthday.

But Louise, from Flockton, had a double lung transplant and it has totally transformed her life.

Now she has urged other people to agree to donate organs to give other people the same chance. She wants them to join the NHS Organ Donor Register.

Louise was born with cystic fibrosis – the country’s most commonly inherited life-threatening disease – but was still fit enough to be a lifeguard at Huddersfield Sports Centre, run her own fashion business and travel the world.

Yet earlier this year the 29-year-old feared she would not make her 30th birthday when the disease caused such massive damage to her lungs that life became a bigger battle each day.

Louise spent most of her time indoors and became almost totally reliant on her husband, Ian.

She could barely walk upstairs, bathing herself was impossible and she needed portable oxygen cylinders and a wheelchair on the rare occasions she left home.

The once-fit lifeguard needed daily physiotherapy to clear her lungs and – having spent nearly two years on the transplant waiting list – was in desperate need of a lung transplant.

Louise was finally given the good news she and her family had been praying for when she got the call that a suitable organ donor had been found.

Just over 10 weeks ago she had a lung transplant at Newcastle’s Freeman Hospital.

Recovering from the major operation has been slow, but Louise is now enjoying a new lease of life.

She said: “I have got a lot more confidence back regarding going out, silly things like going out with mum to the garden centre for coffee.

“It was a big thing to do that before as I would have to take the wheelchair and oxygen. It was a planned event. Now it’s spontaneous, it’s nice.

“I even walked up a steep hill to the post office, which I have never done before.

“I walked on to the pub with Ian and we had lunch. I’m not allowed to go into crowded places like cinemas, but luckily there were only eight people in the pub!”

Louise said it has been a tremendous relief to discard the oxygen cylinders, the wheelchair and the huge number of drugs she was taking.

Her new lungs have given her new life, but she has to take good care of them. She is still restricted in what she can do and can’t go in busy restaurants or big crowds yet.

She is also on a high dose of steroids, which she will be able to reduce once her new lungs have become stabilised. But she will have to take steroids for the rest of her life.

Louise says her transformation has been amazing, with the most fantastic change being her ability to get up and get going in the morning.

She said: “It used to be before midday before I was dressed. Now I am up at eight o’clock and I can make my own breakfast and get myself washed. Ian had to bath me before.”

Now one day Louise hopes to be well enough to get a job and she hopes to start looking for one in the new year.

Her doctors have said they are “pretty positive’’ about her recovery and she is now looking forward to a brighter future.

Louise said: “There’s still a long way to go in my recovery, but I have been given a second chance.

“I think it would have been a massive struggle to get to my 30th birthday next July.

“I saw a lady in my clinic two weeks ago who had a new heart and lungs 17 years ago and she is still fighting fit.

“I would hope I have got a fair few years left in me.”

Louise said her thoughts are never far away from the donor and their family and she plans to write to them.

She said: “I want to say how truly thankful I am that I have been given this chance to live my life again.”

Ian said: “I have got my wife back.

“From the moment she woke up and they took the tube out I started noticing little changes in her. She has a fighting spirit.”

Around 120 lung transplants are performed in the UK each year, but there are nearly 8,000 people waiting for various transplants.

The couple are now urging others to join almost 16m other people – a quarter of the population – on the NHS Organ Donor Register.

Recently they helped organise a sponsored walk of the Three Peaks in Yorkshire.

This raised £8,000 for the cystic fibrosis unit at St James’s Hospital in Leeds and the Willow Foundation, a charity which grants wishes for sick adults.