The inherited disease cystic fibrosis had caused serious lung damage and she spent most of her time indoors, almost totally reliant on her husband Ian.

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

The once-fit former swimming pool lifeguard needed daily physiotherapy to clear her lungs and was desperate to hear the news that an organ donor had been found, following nearly two years on the transplant waiting list.

Just over 10 weeks ago a donor became available and she had a lung transplant at Newcastle's Freeman Hospital.

Recovering from such a major operation has been slow but she is now enjoying a new lease of life.

"I have got a lot more confidence back regarding going out – silly little things like going out with mum to the garden centre for coffee. It was a big thing to do that before. 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 the steep hill to the Post Office, which I have never done before. I walked on to the pub on Sunday with my husband, Ian, and we had lunch. I am not allowed to go into crowded places like cinemas but luckily there were only eight people in the pub," she says.

Mrs Taylor, who lives at Flockton, near Wakefield, says 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 a new life but they have to be taken care of, she says.

"I'm still restricted in what I can do. I can't go to busy restaurants or in big crowds just yet. I am on quite high doses of steriods to suppress my immune system because of this strange new set of lungs. Once my lungs become stabilised and my body is used to having them, the level of drugs will be reduced but I will always be on them."

The most amazing change has been her ability to "get up and get going" in the morning.

"It used to be midday before I was dressed. Now I am up at eight o'clock and I can make my own breakfast and get myself washed. Before, Ian had to bath me."

She now jokes her husband is feeling a bit "lost".

Although she was born with cystic fibrosis, the country's most common inherited life-threatening disease, she was once fit enough to work as a lifeguard at Huddersfield Sports Centre, run her own fashion business and travel the world.

One day she hopes to be well enough to get a job.

"There's still a long way to go in my recovery. I am hoping if things go well, I will look (for a job) in the New Year. I don't know what I want to do yet but I have been given a second chance."

Doctors have been "pretty positive", she says, and her future is now brighter than it was.

"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. She is still fighting fit. I would hope I have got a fair few years in me."

Her thoughts are never far from the donor and their family, whom she plans to write to.

"I want to say how truly thankful I am that I have been given this chance to live my life again.

Her husband is delighted with his wife's progress.

"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 is more lippy, which is lovely. She has a fighting spirit."

The couple are now urging others to join almost 16 million people – 25 per cent of the population – on the NHS Organ Donor Register. Currently there are nearly 8,000 people waiting for various transplants.

And they want to thank everyone who helped raise £8,000 from a sponsored walk of the Three Peaks in Yorkshire. The money went to the cystic fibrosis unit at St James's Hospital in Leeds and the Willow Foundation, a charity which grants wishes for sick adults.