'I owe life to my wife after organ donation' says 89-year-old Yorkshireman planning trip to Antarctic and hoping for more medals in future Transplant Games

The retired technician for ITV Yorkshire was first diagnosed with chronic kidney failure nearly 40 years ago, at the age of 50. He later spent more than two years on dialysis before accepting a donor kidney from wife Ann in 2007.

“She was insistent,” he recalls. “Then, she used to pull my leg by saying you’ve got three kidneys, because they didn’t remove mine, and I’ve got one.”

“I was rejuvenated. I was able to carry on playing squash, which I used to do, and do a bit of mountain climbing again.”

Since the following year, Mike has taken part in the British and World Transplant Games, an opportunity for transplant recipients, donors and their families to celebrate the gift of life through sport and to raise awareness of the importance of organ donation.

He was told about the competition by a senior renal nurse in Bradford, as he had always been a keen sportsman.

Ann has seen Mike win countless medals in the Games at both national and international levels. But these days, she is unable to join him, suffering from dementia and cared for in a local nursing home.

Mike, who lives in Draughton, near Skipton, North Yorkshire, makes sure he takes her with him in spirit, however, wearing a photograph of the pair of them around his neck as he prepares to compete. “She’s still there in spirit if not in place,” he says. “She’s always with me.”

“She was well known and loved the Games,” he adds. “People always ask after her. It’s another way of honouring the concept of donation - that someone gives an organ and you never forget their gift.”

Earlier this year, Mike was awarded four medals at the British Transplant Games, in Oxford - three silver in squash and the 5km, and 800m races, and a gold in the 1500m.

He was then the oldest Team GB competitor at this year’s World Transplant Games in Dresden, Germany, bringing home four golds.

“It’s a great way of advertising to the outside world the whole process of losing a function…and the reliance on organ donation,” he says of the Games.

“It’s very enjoyable and satisfying. (In the beginning), it was also something to take my mind off the whole situation as well and meet up with like-minded people who had experienced similar things that I had.”

Mike still plans to compete in more Games and is looking forward to his trip to the Antarctic to celebrate turning 90 in February.

“I have accumulated many medals over the years,” he says. “I accept that at my age, I don’t have many competitors, so sometimes I get a medal because I am the only one - but I treasure them nonetheless.

“I’ve always been interested in sport - climbing mountains, running and squash. I’m also very into wild places, so Antarctica is somewhere different. I’ve always wanted to go so I have booked it to commemorate my ‘big’ birthday.

“I’ve no intention of giving up competing at the Games just yet. I am going to have accept that time is not on my side and someday I will have to curb my enthusiasm - but I will cross that bridge when I get there.”

Until then, Michael will continue to train two to three days a week, each day grateful to Ann and to the medical and nursing team at St Luke’s Hospital’s renal unit, part of Bradford Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust.

“I am forever indebted to the wonderful medical care – which continues to this day –which has allowed me to enjoy my sport,” he says.

Earlier this year, NHS Blood and Transplant revealed the nation’s transplant waiting list had reached its highest level ever recorded at 8,000 people.

Last month, Organ Donation Week was held to raise awareness about the need for more donors and increase the number of people on the NHS Organ Donor Register.

“Organ donation is wonderful – and there’s more need now than ever there has ever been,” Mike says.

"It’s a life-saving and life changing operation. Eighteen years more life – I think about it nearly every day, especially now with Ann’s situation. I owe her my life. I am truly grateful.”