Help John smell the Roses again.

This is for my good friend John. When he was 16 he was diagnosed with Wegener’s Granulomatosis (a form of vasculitis which basically means his white blood cells went into overdrive and started attacking parts of his body). This affected his kidneys, eyes, skin and lungs. He went through a lot of health issues for five years after the diagnosis that were all derivative of the vasculitis such as multiple strokes, kidney failure, scarring on his lungs and face and pulmonary edema to name a few. When he was 19 the disease was thought to be in remission. 2 years later at age 21 John received a kidney from his dad and as a result he started living a normal life as an adult. A few years ago John started experiencing what he thought was really bad hay fever, but after months of struggling it was found to be the disease coming out of remission. The disease started attacking John’s sinuses and after 6 months his septum and part of his skull had been completely dissolved.

Once again treatment was administered to bring the disease back into remission which eventually happened. For over 2 years John has had no septum (a condition known as saddle nose) and as one of his close friends I have watched his self esteem dwindle. It’s been hard for my friends and I to see this happen to our friend and it’s been harder on his parents to watch their son suffer. Last year one of John’s specialists suggested he have reconstructive surgery. When John told everyone the news I saw so much hope and happiness coming from him, something I hadn’t seen from him in years. He and his family have been working hard to save up some money for the cost of surgery and living expenses for the recovery period of 8 weeks but they aren’t quite there.


The surgery involves 2 surgeons and will be a 2 step process. The first process involves building the structure of the nose and septum using bone and cartilage from one of his ribs after it is removed and also using flesh from his arm. At that point a temporary bit of skin will be put over the created nose and then after 4 weeks the second surgery will take place and 4 weeks after that John should be fully recovered.


John is a strong, kind, compassionate and hard-working man that brings joy to the people around him. It would be a great gift if I could give something back to John for all that he does for others and I know if he has this surgery there’ll be nothing stopping him.

The date of the first surgery is set for 20/02/2020 Any donations will be greatly appreciated and any donation money that isn’t used will go to the Red Cross to help those affected by the fires.