Want to be more involved? Read on...

LLTGL are looking for potential new Trustees to add to our energetic and hard-working board.

If this is something you might be interested in, or that you would like to find out more about, please can you email info [at] lltgl.org.uk.

Thanks!

the LLTGL Team

Our utterly amazing Advocates: 4

Working our way up the country but now veering sideways, Advocate number 4 is our Welsh Advocate, the lovely Andrea Evans.

Andrea is a very modest and unassuming young lady who just gets on with things, but hopefully she'll forgive us for bigging her up a bit here! When Andrea was 16 years old, she contracted Meningitis, resulting in her being hospitalised for over nine months, requiring a double amputation of her lower legs and going into kidney failure.

Andrea was placed on the waiting list for a new kidney and got her life-changing call on Christmas day in 2003.

Inspired by the incredible team who cared for her at such a difficult time, Andrea now works as a nurse and somehow finds time to do lots and lots for LLTGL.

Andrea is our liaison for the Welsh campaigns we work along side, such as Donate Wales. She is a regular in the Welsh press and initiated our campaign encouraging people to contact their local cinema's and ask them to stock Organ Donation leaflets whilst the film My Sister's Keeper was showing. Andrea was also responsible for us being featured on the Vodaphone advert when she sat on top of a giant charity tin declaring that she would give donate her time to LLTGL!

Andrea is a bit of an adrenaline junkie and jumped at the chance to abseil down the lighthouse with Holly and team to raise around £3000 for us.

Andrea and Holly at the Abseil; one noticably more relaxed than the other!

You can find out more about Andrea on her biog page here. We're extremely grateful to have Andrea, her creativity and her drive on board so thank you Andrea and keep up the fab work!

The Great Valentine's Cake Bake

So, I'm slowly getting into this whole blogging thing, bringing you an update from one of the many amazing Cake Bake's that went on over the Valentine's weekend.


Our fabvocate, Louise Lawrence, organised an amazing Cake Bake in Thornton Heath. She had everything covered from organising local press, weeks of flyering, interviews and not to mention baking over 100 cupcakes! Take a look at her blog for more info on what she got up to.


You can see more of these amazing pics on our facebook group
Send us your stories and pictures to info@lltgl.org.uk so that we can update everyone here on your success - plus, we want to share your pics and give some more inspiration for next year!

Also, don't forget to send in donations you raised at your events. The easiest way to do so is through our justgiving page

Thanks so much to everyone for making it another Great Valentine Cake Bake! Already looking forward to the cakes next year!!

Matt

Welcoming our new patient ambassadors!

Tor
Rachy

Here at LLTGL we've always known that our biggest strength is the fact that so many people from the Transplant community get involved in what we do. When trying to educate people as to the importance of Organ Donation, there is nothing stronger than a real life story, and that is why we are so thrilled to welcome Rachael Wakefield (Rachy) and Victoria Tremlett (Tor) on board as Patient Ambassadors for LLTGL.

Tor and Rachy have a lot in common. Both are 22 years old, both very intelligent and very beautiful, and both waiting for a life-saving double lung transplant. With only 50% of those waiting for lungs receiving them in time, Tor and Rachy are faced with the terrible fact that statistically, one of them will die.

Both girls have already used their stories to raise awareness but have now decided to team up to become patient ambassadors for us and to open up the story of their wait, in the hope that it will motivate those who hear it to sign the Organ Donor Register.

The girls will be keeping a joint blog here but you can read their own personal blogs here (Tor's) and here (Rachy's).

We are indescribably grateful to both girls for agreeing to share their wait for transplant, in the hope of raising awareness and helping all those waiting for transplants in the UK.

Our utterly amazing Advocates: 3

London-based Advocate number 2....step forward Louise Lawrence!

Anyone who knows Lou would tell you straight away that she has the biggest heart on the planet. Lou cannot hear about something sad without wanting to do something about it! One of the many reasons we are so lucky to have her on the team.

Meeting bubbly and unassuming Lou you'd never guess the amount of medical drama she has gone through in her lifetime, including battling childhood cancer, end-stage lung disease, transplant and now heart failure and a rare complication of post-transplant cancer.

Lou speaking out about her transplant journey and her gratitude despite her complications.

Despite all of this, Lou is one of our hardest-working Advocates and her monthly reports are full of updates including things such as campaigning via twitter, designing and sending out her own stickers, supporting fellow patients, talking to staff at the London Chest Hospital about her work with LLTGL, and her rather infamous sponsored tree-hug - you can see the video here.

Read more about Lou's story on her biog page here. Lou - well done and thank you for devoting so much energy to LLTGL...your efforts make a huge difference.

Our utterly amazing Advocates: 2

Time to introduce our next fantabulous Advocate: Miss Nehal Shah!

Nehal (or Nelly as she is known) appears to be ver quiet and very shy when you first meet her. However appearances can be extremely deceiving! Nelly lives in Stanmore and is one of our London Advocates. Originally from Kenya, Nelly was diagnosed with End Stage Renal Failure in 2002 and spent 8 long months in hospital from 2002 - 2003.

Due to complications arising from her kidney failure, Nelly is confined to a wheelchair, but that definitely does not stop her! In fact, her biggest organised event for LLTGL to date was a sponsored walk! You can see a video of Nelly and her friends and family undertaking this by clicking here.

Nelly's caring nature means she jumps at the chance to advise and support fellow patients and the staff at her transplant unit regularly put people in touch with her.

Nelly champions awareness for minority ethnic groups as she knows that part of the reason she had to wait seven long years was due to the lack of donors from the asian community.

Nelly at ICAP's Charity day 2009

More about Nelly can be found on her advocate biog page. Well done for all your fantastic work and support Nelly and thank you for everything that you do.

Talking talking talking...

One of the many ways we go about raising awareness is by going and doing talks for various groups. It doesn't matter what the group or how many people - be it medics, school children, Rotary club members or just a collection of random people - if they're willing to listen, we're willing to talk!

This is something many of our advocates are very good at - take a look at Holly's blog about her latest talk at Arrowe Park Hospital by clicking here.

Are you interested in helping us spread the word by giving talks and sharing your story that way? If you think you might be able to help, please get in touch via the website as we have some more speaking-related developments coming very soon....

Watch this space!

x

Justgiving Awards 2010.

Matt here, tell you about our fab evening at the Justgiving Awards!

Emily was invited to present the award for Most Popular Fundraiser at Wednesday night’s inaugural Just Giving Awards, held at the RIBA building in London. It’s nice to know your place in the charity, when I was invited as her plus one ;-)

I don’t think either of us expected it to be as formal as it was, nor expected to see so many people, so we decided that a) yes, Emily, you should have written a speech earlier and b) we made a good decision on wearing matching pink outfits!

We met a number of “big” charities who told us how much they admire us as a charity. Upon hearing that our entire team is built of purely volunteers, many of them were left speechless.

The highlight of our (and well, everyone’s) night was waiting for Major Phil Packer to speak. If you’re unfamiliar with his story, think back to the London Marathon last year and the man that walked it in 14 days…It’s quite incredible hearing this man’s journey and more importantly to hear of his plans for the future. A very selfless man, he’s now dedicating his time to young people & young people with disabilities. It’s well worth checking out his website and seeing if you can help him along the way by visiting his Justgiving page. We had to track him down after the main event as there was no way Emily was going to leave without a picture with him!

I’d like to say that Emily was speechless when her turn came to announce the award for most Popular Fundraiser but I think we’d all know I’d be lying! It went down very well and we were both surprised at how many people put their hand up when she asked who is definitely on the Organ Donor Register. I was amazed at how many people have been following her story - she’s something of a mini-celebrity in the JG towers.

It must have been incredibly hard to choose the winners as everyone in every category had an inspirational story to tell. Take a look at just a few that stood out to me:

Sophie Atay www.justgiving.com/sophie-appeal

Robyn Higgins www.justgiving.com/robyn-appeal

Alice Halstead www.justgiving.com/alice-halstead

In summary, everywhere you turned there was an inspirational story waiting to be told. I know we both left feeling very positive and full of ideas for LLTGL’s future. If we haven’t said it already, we’re also eternally thankful to all the advocates, volunteers & of course Trustee’s that help make it all happen for us.

It’s my first blog post… be kind ;-)

Matt

Fantastic Fundraising Opportunities.

It's almost that time of year again... Yep, Valentines Day is creeping up on us and soon we’ll be surrounded with overpriced bouquets of roses and boxes of chocolates begging to be bought.

Last year we ran our first ever Great Valentines Cake Bake and it was such a success, we're doing it all over again! So how does it work?

Simple! We ask you to use this Valentines Day to help us help them with a holding a red-themed cake sale! By selling your baked goodies in aid of LLTGL you can help us help the thousands of people out there desperately waiting for a transplant that could save their lives.

Maybe you could hold one at work on the Friday, invite friends round to bring and buy on the Saturday, or at a Church group on the Sunday.... there are dozens of possibilities!

Colourful cakes for sale at the Pick Me Up! offices in London last year.

We loved seeing your photos from last years events around the country, so make sure you send us some to look at again this year!

If you're on Facebook there is an event page here, with more information, tips and hints on our website.

If after that you've eaten too much cake and feel like doing a physical challenge, how about signing up to something like The Newham London Run, which is taking place on 7th March?! Entry closes on 14th February so if you are interested, check out the website!


Thanks to all of you who work so hard to raise funds for us; we can only do what we do because of your generosity and support. Don't forget to drop us a line telling us about your Fundraising efforts so we can big you up on here!


Love,

x