Closing our Unexpected Double Lung Transplant Experience and Lessons Learned
My husband, Randy, received a double lung transplant in 2013. It came as a huge shock. Randy had always enjoyed perfect health, and suddenly we were facing a future none of us could have imagined. At the time, we were told his life expectancy was 50% at five years. This past January, after 12 1/2 years of life post-transplant, we lost him. The lung transplant was unexpected; the ending, in many ways, was not. Expected or unexpected, life has a way of surprising us.
I began writing about this unexpected journey on Travels with Tam after we learned, in August 2013, that Randy needed a double lung transplant. He had been scheduled for a biopsy, but before we could get there, his lung capacity suddenly dropped to 21%, and he was taken to the hospital. A week later, his lungs fell to 0%, and he was placed on ECMO, a machine that supported him while he was in a medically induced coma. He remained on it for nearly two weeks. After 12 days, I was told he would be removed from ECMO within a couple of days because he was nearing the point where recovery might no longer be possible. The next day, the doctor told me there was a chance they had found lungs. By the following morning, Randy was in surgery.
What followed was a long recovery and the beginning of a journey that often felt like a roller coaster. I have never liked roller coasters; they give me motion sickness and fill me with fear. I would have preferred the Ferris wheel—slow, steady, predictable. But alas, the roller coaster ruled.
I blogged about the events as they happened, doing my best to stay positive. I never doubted that he would live, I knew in my heart that it was not his time. Randy seemed to have 99 lives throughout those 12 1/2 years; every time he came close to the end, he rebounded. Afterward, when he came home, he read my posts and they moved him tremendously. Randy was upset about all he had put his family through, and we were devastated by what he lived through. He did, however, ask me not to continue writing about the transplant and its aftereffects, both on him and on our lives, at least not the negative ones. I honored that request and wrote mostly about the good things—the moments he was able to experience because of that life-saving transplant. He saw both of his children marry, welcomed four beautiful grandchildren, and enjoyed close friendships, travel, and family. What I did not share was the cost, or the fuller truth of what living after a double lung transplant was like—not only for him, but for all of us.
I have come to believe that, in some ways, whitewashing the experience was a disservice. Those 12 years brought joy, love, deep gratitude, and countless blessings. They also brought suffering, fear, dark days, and constant change and upheaval. Life changes us in so many different ways. We all move through many iterations of ourselves. We experience life, birth, death, illness, and their aftermath differently. And most of us know, in one way or another, that some events change us forever. I have learned (again) that Life can be brutally unfair. Some hurts cannot simply be healed or gotten over; they have to be lived through. We are human, and we are fallible. We have all lived through suffering and hard times, and I believe it helps when we tell the truth about what we have seen, what we have learned, and what we have carried.
There are stories and truths to be shared about living with uncertainty, illness, and emotional distress. Information about medications and their side effects matter. So do the difficulties of personality changes, misunderstandings, doctor visits, hospital stays, crisis’s, and constant change—parts of lung transplant life most people have no idea exist. Strength, love, forgiveness, friendship, forbearance, and steadfastness are also part of the story. So is stress. Perhaps both sides of the story will benefit someone in the future or help increase understanding and empathy. I hope so. That is most of my reason to continue sharing the story and the loss, and I will try to do so without invading the privacies Randy wanted kept to ourselves, but I do want to acknowledge his strength and bravery. Randy was a guy who passed out when he saw blood or a needle, but his courage overcame his phobia. And it took courage to survive for 12 1/2 years after a double lung transplant.
What though the radiance which was once so bright, be now forever taken from my sight,
Though nothing can bring back the hour of Splendour in the Grass, of Glory in the Flower,
We will grieve not, rather find Strength in what remains behind.
William Wordsworth
Celebration of Life, March 13, 2026
We did it the way Randy would want it, with cocktails, food, friends, and a lot of stories.
The Celebration Gallery
Without our friends and family, we could never have made it through these challenging times. Thank you, from the bottom of my heart.
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