FITOT Fondazione per l'Incremento dei Trapianti d'Organo e di Tessuti O.N.L.U.S.

My name is Federico, I'm 34 years old and I live in Casciana Terme, a village in the province of Pisa. My story starts in 1994, when at 18 I was diagnosed with a rather rare disease that affected by bile ducts and colon. No-one knew what caused it, and they didn't know how to treat it either. The only thing that was certain, they told me, was that sooner or later I would need a liver transplant. It could be just a year later, or ten years, or twenty.....

In 2001 my condition worsened and every month I felt more and more ill. My university studies came to a sudden halt. So did going out with friends. This went on until January 2003, when things got a lot worse, and I had fever every day. And when I say fever, I mean a temperature of 40 degrees or more. I spent about eight months almost constantly in hospital. In May, Professor Filipponi, from the Transplant Centre in Cisanello hospital in Pisa, decided that the only solution was a liver transplant. In this period my life underwent a strange transformation Nothing I did seemed worth it any more. I felt life leaving my body and my mind. The waiting lasted two months and ten days. I received my transplant on 29 June 2003, on a Tuesday morning. I had a secret dream that came true when I won 6 medals, including three gold, one silver and two bronze at the 15^th World Transplant Games in Canada in July 2005. I established a world record for 50 metre breast stroke. It was a fantastic experience, particularly in human terms. Being part of a group of five thousand transplant recipients was amazing. Today my life is a normal one! I do all the things that my illness used to prevent me doing, before! And then there was another miracle. I became a dad! Rebecca was born! And this event made me stop and think. If my donor hadn't donated his/her organs I would almost certainly be dead, given my condition. And my daughter would never have been born.  But by saying "Yes" to donation he brought me back to life, which gave life to her, too. And if in the future Rebecca grows up and has a child, my donor will have saved three lives. And if it happens that my donor donated all seven organs to young people who had children after the transplant? How many lives could be linked to a decision to say "Yes"... a whole generation.

Federico Finozzi