Mark & NiQi... our children

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Our second child, Mark was born in March 1986. He was diagnozed at 15 months after going back and forth regularly to our GP as he was always sick. When Mark was 5 years old we took in NiQi who was then 6 months old and just diagnozed with CF. We knew when we started fostering her that she had CF and she her disease was completely different to that of Mark. Mark was diagnozed after he had 'failure to thrive'. Both his chest and his digestive system were badly affected. He passed away, aged 9, in July 1995. NiQi was very active as a youngster and then her problem was mainly with her digestive system. As a teenager she developed asthma and her chest started to give her problems. At the end of 2011 her right lung collapsed and we very nearly lost her. She weighed 46kg, had a lungs function of 17% and was bed bound. She determined to live and strove to improve so she could be listed for a lung transplant. Her lung function improved to 30% and her weight improved which she maintained for a couple of years. Then she started deteriorating again and was listed in September 2014. February 2017 she received her transplant. After years of battling to breathe and not working since August 2015, NiQi now has plenty to look forward to.