Introducing Lung and a Half

Hello, our name is Lung and a Half and we have the pleasure of keeping Amy alive and breathing and supplying her body with oxygen every day of her life.

We haven’t always been known as lung and a half, but when Amy got sick with some weird disease in her lungs in 1995 the doctors decided that to keep the damage from spreading into the rest of her lung they would just remove half of our right lung, the top right lobe, and now we keep Amy going with one and half lungs.

It’s not always easy being her lungs; sometimes she will give us oxygen from a machine or from a little metal tank, but not very often. It really doesn't make us breathe better; it just forces more oxygen into us and really boosts her oxygen level to the rest of her body.

We feel so bad for her sometimes, especially when she is having a really bad day and can’t walk from her kitchen table to the sink. But then somehow she makes us work harder and she gets more energy and she get through the day. Some times she gets so mad she cleans the whole house and mops and does windows just to get us going better. One day she even moved the living room furniture around.

She is amazing when it comes to that. She amazes us sometimes.

Amy really loves us too. A few years ago she was going to Cleveland Clinic for consultations for a double lung transplant. The doctors said she would live longer with the lungs of a stranger, but she refused. 

Amy has beaten the odd and has lived longer than a lung transplant lasts, which is only ten years. She always tells us that she is so glad she kept us, that we do a great job. And that the two people she did know that had lungs transplants in 2007 died, and they didn't ever live ten years.

She always tells us she would rather breath with us doing the job we do than trying to get someone else's lungs to work in her. She is happy with her decision to keep us.She said that she might never wake up from the operation and she doesn't want to take that chance. 

She always thanks us for the great job we do, and thanks God for healing us and keeping us breathing when the x-rays clearly show that the damage is extensive and she probably shouldn't even be able to breath; or walk or even live by herself … but she does.

And she does a great job! She thanks God for that everyday.

We do get tired, but we don’t get sick anymore. We seem to be doing really well this winter and expect it to stay this way, and we expect to keep Amy breathing for a very long time. When we get tires she knows and she rests for a while. And then she gets back up and does something else. She keeps us in pretty good working order.

She says she has too much work to do for her to just sit still and not do anything. She has too many people to help, too many places to go and see. She says she may not be running but she sure can get around, even if it takes longer than other people. When people ask her why she is so out of breath and ask “are you OK,” She is so gracious and just says “Yes, I am fine. This is how I breathe, I will be OK. Please don’t worry about me,” and she will go sit down and catch her breath, and then she is fine.

She always knows we will get her through whatever she may be doing and we are so glad to be breathing for her.

We may not be perfect lungs, but we are Amy’s lungs and we are so glad to keep her breathing. She believes with every breath she is healed and getting better, and so do we, and we keep on doing our job. 

We are glad to be of service to Amy, she is very special and we work hard because she kept us and we will do our job to the best of our ability, every single day. 

Even if part of us is missing; We are so glad to breath for her.

This is what my lungs look like in an X-ray ... black.