PHighting with Marion
Donation protected
“Everyone, no matter how big and strong, could use a little help sometimes. Never be afraid to ask for help when you need it. What are we here for if not for each other?”
The disease
Our mom, Marion, has always been a healthy role model – physically, mentally and spiritually – to her family, her friends, our community, and us. Despite her healthy living habits, we started to notice she had difficulty walking up the stairs without losing her breath, and she became breathless doing a lot of her normal day to day activities. After many tests, mom was diagnosed with Pulmonary Hypertension (PH) in 2009.
“Pulmonary hypertension begins when tiny arteries in your lungs, called pulmonary arteries, and capillaries become narrowed, blocked or destroyed. This makes it harder for blood to flow through your lungs, and raises pressure within your lungs' arteries. As the pressure builds, your heart's lower right chamber (right ventricle) must work harder to pump blood through your lungs, eventually causing your heart muscle to weaken and eventually fail.
Pulmonary hypertension is a serious illness that becomes progressively worse and is sometimes fatal. Although pulmonary hypertension isn't curable, treatments are available that can help lessen symptoms and improve your quality of life.”
Shortly after being diagnosed, she had to give up her job and passion of hairdressing. If asked she would tell you her favourite part was her customers, and the relationships she had built with them. She enjoyed doing yoga in her small town of Russell, and every winter her and her friends would go on weekly ski trips to Quebec. Once her symptoms worsened, and her lack of energy and oxygen became too great, she had to give up her hobbies in order to concentrate on her health.
The journey
Despite mom’s best efforts in trying to stay healthy and mobile, small tasks such as climbing a flight of stairs, getting dressed, or playing with her 5 grandchildren became too difficult. Her cardiology team (at the Ottawa Hospital's Civic Campus Heart Institute) said that it was time to have oxygen set up in her home for around the clock aid, and that she needed to use portable tanks for any trips outside the home. This made getting around the house easier, but small errands such as getting the mail, picking up groceries, or visiting with friends became a more complicated task.
Our dad, Jim, was a dedicated and hardworking man in the private sector of the Aviation industry for many years, and was forced to take an early retirement in January 2014 to care for our mom. That spring, her cardiology team in Ottawa transferred her file to Toronto General, where she could seek more specialized help. Her world-renowned surgeon at Toronto General's Peter Munk Cardiac Centre felt confident in doing surgery on her lungs and heart, in hopes to remove some of the blocked arteries. This would allow her to breathe more easily and re-gain some quality of life. After a 12 hour surgery, she spent a total of 4 months in Toronto’s Intensive Care Unit (ICU). Our dad had to stay in a rented apartment in downtown Toronto during mom’s entire stay, in order to be within walking distance of the hospital in case of any emergencies. Us kids, our grandma, aunts and uncles, cousins, and more family and friends gathered at the most crucial times to show their support and visited her and my dad as often as they could. Due to multiple setbacks including, but not limited to, 2 episodes of cardiac arrest, a subdural hematoma, and the condition her body was in, the surgery was deemed unsuccessful.
Following her first stay in Toronto, she was placed on a life dependant medication that is administered through a permanent IV (Hickman line). This medication is not covered by OHIP, and costs roughly $100,000 annually. There are only 3 people in the Ottawa region that are on this particular medication. Since it is so foreign to the Ottawa area medical system, a family member must administer it. Our dad was taught how to properly mix the medication and change her lines daily.
Our sister Jennifer, the eldest daughter, works full time as a Registered Nurse at Kingston General Hospital. She was able to take a month leave from work to stay with mom, at our family home in Russell, following her return from Toronto. This greatly helped ease our parents into their new lifestyle.
If not stubborn, our mom has amazing determination. She was eager to get back on the horse and do anything she could to get better. She completed 12 weeks of rehab in Ottawa, continued with physiotherapy in Embrun, and even started back at yoga in Russell and Metcalfe.
The next chapter
Unfortunately, her condition did not improve as we had all hoped. The journey from then until now has not been easy, and is about to take on a completely new chapter. In July 2015, she started to retain a lot of water weight, which is a sign of congestive heart failure. When your heart is not properly pumping blood, your other organs try to compensate by retaining fluid, almost as “survival mode”. This leads to fluid build up in the lungs and surrounding body tissue. This is a very dangerous state for your body to be in. She has since been in the Ottawa Civic Hospital’s Heart Institute awaiting news from Toronto.
On Friday, July 31st, we received that long awaited news from the teams and Doctors at Toronto General Hospital. She is eligible to receive a double lung transplant, and potentially a heart transplant as well. She will soon be transferred to Toronto General by air ambulance for constant surveillance until a donor match is found. Our dad will be following her to Toronto for a minimum of 4 months during her pre and post-surgery stay.
Thank you
This journey has been nothing short of terrifying, amazing, and eye opening. We could not have done any of it without the support of our family, friends, colleagues, and communities. No words can ever express how thankful our family is to have the support of every single one of you.
What you can do to help
There has been an extraordinary amount of people asking how they can help relieve the mountain of stress. We are setting up this GoFundMe for just that purpose. Anything anyone could offer, from pennies to dollars, will go straight to Marion, and every little bit counts.
We will try to provide you with regular updates on this page, but we do ask that everyone respects our family’s privacy during this difficult time.
Even if you cannot donate, send your prayers, positive thoughts, and well wishes her way. She needs them now more than ever.
Those of you who know our mom know that she has amazing physical strength and will power. If anyone can defy the odds and overcome this surgery, she can.
Love & Gratitude,
Her kids - Bill McMillan, Jennifer Feeley, Melissa Currie, and Emily Feeley
The disease
Our mom, Marion, has always been a healthy role model – physically, mentally and spiritually – to her family, her friends, our community, and us. Despite her healthy living habits, we started to notice she had difficulty walking up the stairs without losing her breath, and she became breathless doing a lot of her normal day to day activities. After many tests, mom was diagnosed with Pulmonary Hypertension (PH) in 2009.
“Pulmonary hypertension begins when tiny arteries in your lungs, called pulmonary arteries, and capillaries become narrowed, blocked or destroyed. This makes it harder for blood to flow through your lungs, and raises pressure within your lungs' arteries. As the pressure builds, your heart's lower right chamber (right ventricle) must work harder to pump blood through your lungs, eventually causing your heart muscle to weaken and eventually fail.
Pulmonary hypertension is a serious illness that becomes progressively worse and is sometimes fatal. Although pulmonary hypertension isn't curable, treatments are available that can help lessen symptoms and improve your quality of life.”
Shortly after being diagnosed, she had to give up her job and passion of hairdressing. If asked she would tell you her favourite part was her customers, and the relationships she had built with them. She enjoyed doing yoga in her small town of Russell, and every winter her and her friends would go on weekly ski trips to Quebec. Once her symptoms worsened, and her lack of energy and oxygen became too great, she had to give up her hobbies in order to concentrate on her health.
The journey
Despite mom’s best efforts in trying to stay healthy and mobile, small tasks such as climbing a flight of stairs, getting dressed, or playing with her 5 grandchildren became too difficult. Her cardiology team (at the Ottawa Hospital's Civic Campus Heart Institute) said that it was time to have oxygen set up in her home for around the clock aid, and that she needed to use portable tanks for any trips outside the home. This made getting around the house easier, but small errands such as getting the mail, picking up groceries, or visiting with friends became a more complicated task.
Our dad, Jim, was a dedicated and hardworking man in the private sector of the Aviation industry for many years, and was forced to take an early retirement in January 2014 to care for our mom. That spring, her cardiology team in Ottawa transferred her file to Toronto General, where she could seek more specialized help. Her world-renowned surgeon at Toronto General's Peter Munk Cardiac Centre felt confident in doing surgery on her lungs and heart, in hopes to remove some of the blocked arteries. This would allow her to breathe more easily and re-gain some quality of life. After a 12 hour surgery, she spent a total of 4 months in Toronto’s Intensive Care Unit (ICU). Our dad had to stay in a rented apartment in downtown Toronto during mom’s entire stay, in order to be within walking distance of the hospital in case of any emergencies. Us kids, our grandma, aunts and uncles, cousins, and more family and friends gathered at the most crucial times to show their support and visited her and my dad as often as they could. Due to multiple setbacks including, but not limited to, 2 episodes of cardiac arrest, a subdural hematoma, and the condition her body was in, the surgery was deemed unsuccessful.
Following her first stay in Toronto, she was placed on a life dependant medication that is administered through a permanent IV (Hickman line). This medication is not covered by OHIP, and costs roughly $100,000 annually. There are only 3 people in the Ottawa region that are on this particular medication. Since it is so foreign to the Ottawa area medical system, a family member must administer it. Our dad was taught how to properly mix the medication and change her lines daily.
Our sister Jennifer, the eldest daughter, works full time as a Registered Nurse at Kingston General Hospital. She was able to take a month leave from work to stay with mom, at our family home in Russell, following her return from Toronto. This greatly helped ease our parents into their new lifestyle.
If not stubborn, our mom has amazing determination. She was eager to get back on the horse and do anything she could to get better. She completed 12 weeks of rehab in Ottawa, continued with physiotherapy in Embrun, and even started back at yoga in Russell and Metcalfe.
The next chapter
Unfortunately, her condition did not improve as we had all hoped. The journey from then until now has not been easy, and is about to take on a completely new chapter. In July 2015, she started to retain a lot of water weight, which is a sign of congestive heart failure. When your heart is not properly pumping blood, your other organs try to compensate by retaining fluid, almost as “survival mode”. This leads to fluid build up in the lungs and surrounding body tissue. This is a very dangerous state for your body to be in. She has since been in the Ottawa Civic Hospital’s Heart Institute awaiting news from Toronto.
On Friday, July 31st, we received that long awaited news from the teams and Doctors at Toronto General Hospital. She is eligible to receive a double lung transplant, and potentially a heart transplant as well. She will soon be transferred to Toronto General by air ambulance for constant surveillance until a donor match is found. Our dad will be following her to Toronto for a minimum of 4 months during her pre and post-surgery stay.
Thank you
This journey has been nothing short of terrifying, amazing, and eye opening. We could not have done any of it without the support of our family, friends, colleagues, and communities. No words can ever express how thankful our family is to have the support of every single one of you.
What you can do to help
There has been an extraordinary amount of people asking how they can help relieve the mountain of stress. We are setting up this GoFundMe for just that purpose. Anything anyone could offer, from pennies to dollars, will go straight to Marion, and every little bit counts.
We will try to provide you with regular updates on this page, but we do ask that everyone respects our family’s privacy during this difficult time.
Even if you cannot donate, send your prayers, positive thoughts, and well wishes her way. She needs them now more than ever.
Those of you who know our mom know that she has amazing physical strength and will power. If anyone can defy the odds and overcome this surgery, she can.
Love & Gratitude,
Her kids - Bill McMillan, Jennifer Feeley, Melissa Currie, and Emily Feeley
Organizer
Emily Feeley
Organizer
Russell, ON