Career Pivot Post-Transplant: Finding New Passion After Pulmonary Hypertension
I’m going to talk to you today about career pivots after being diagnosed with pulmonary hypertension or, in my case, even more so after transplant.
Let’s go back a bit. As well as inheriting pulmonary hypertension through my DNA — I had a genetic form — I also inherited my absolute passion for dogs. My mum loved dogs, and that is definitely something that was passed on to me.
We always lived with dogs. From before I was born, there were dogs in the house, and that continued all the way through my childhood. When my mum remarried, there were actually about eleven dogs in the house at one stage — Irish setters, beautiful, beautiful dogs.
My mum used to show the dogs, so we spent many weekends away at dog shows, meeting up with friends, playing with the other children, playing with the dogs, going on long walks, taking the dogs on holiday, and making sure we found dog-friendly accommodation.
So really, dogs have always been a huge part of my life.
When I first moved away from home after university, I moved abroad and started working in the Italian Alps. For the first time, I was without a dog. That continued for the next few years, when we worked very long hours and then, out of season, enjoyed long holidays away. We simply did not have a lifestyle that was suited to being dog owners. And I missed dogs immensely.
During that period, I was working in events in different settings. I worked with tourists as a rep, managing holiday resorts, and then organising events for large companies. I also managed venues, hotels, bars, discos, and all kinds of similar places. I was very much in the middle of lots and lots of people.
It was a lot of fun, but it was exhausting. I spent a lot of time on my feet — so much so that, even while I was on the transplant list, I was still working 12-hour days on my feet, behind the bar, managing the bar and looking after events in the nightclub.
It was exhausting. Obviously, in the end, I had to give that up.
Post-transplant, I was told that there were some types of work I should no longer do. One of those was working in spaces full of other people and all their germs. Things like colds and flu are obviously much easier to catch post-transplant because of the medication we are on, and the effects can be worse for us. Naturally, I wanted to avoid that.
So I gave up working in bars and venues. I did a little bit of events work, but made sure it was always during the summer months so I could avoid flu season. Then, of course, COVID came along, and I could no longer avoid the risk. It was an all-year-round virus. After that, I stopped working in event management altogether, even in hotels. I just did not think it was worth the risk.
During this time, after my transplant, I had gone a whole 12 months without having a dog at home, as you are advised to do. Very unfortunately, just one week before I finally got my successful transplant call, our dog, Sheila, had passed away. It was a horrible time, obviously. Then, of course, I was lucky enough to receive a transplant.
So I went 12 months without a dog in our home. I have to say, though, I often offered other dog owners I knew free dog walking, just so I could take a dog out with me while I was rehabbing. As anyone who has ever had dogs knows, the only proper way to go for a walk is with a dog for company. Otherwise, it is just not the same.
Eventually, the 12 months passed. I had already been looking at dogs online, especially shelter dogs, because I did not want to go into an indoor shelter and risk exposure to germs while choosing a dog. I knew that would be difficult. There are plenty of dogs looking for homes advertised online, so I was looking across Italy, where I live.
Obviously, that search intensified the closer I got to the 12-month mark.
Eventually, my partner Paolo and I settled on a dog called Lola. She came from the south of Italy, from Campobasso, where she had been found roaming the streets. She had clearly just had puppies, as her milk was drying up when she was rescued. In fact, she had jumped into someone’s car to be rescued. Knowing her as I later did, I think she had probably heard a loud bang and panicked.
Anyway, she was the dog we chose.
She was a beautiful dog, just the most beautiful dog. She was a crossbreed, definitely an ex-hunting dog, with lots of different dogs in there. But every single part of her was hunting dog. She was 100% hunting dog.
As I later learned over the years, she was a tracking dog. Her reason for living was to follow a scent for kilometres and kilometres, for hours and hours, and only really stop when she could no longer put one paw in front of the other.
So Lola came to us.
She was quite traumatised. She was scared of everything. She was terrified of noises. She did not really love people. She was worried by a lot of them, especially men. She was also worried by toddlers. She had lots of issues.
But she was a lovely, sweet-natured dog, and slowly, slowly, she started to come out of herself.
In my efforts to help her, I started to learn more and more about dogs. Obviously, there is a huge amount of information online. I had to trawl through all the aversive training approaches before I found something that really resonated with me.
I finally found a games-based training approach from UK-based trainers, which I absolutely adored. They also offered online training. I fully immersed myself in that as a way to help Lola with all her difficulties in life.
And, as I say, she started to become happier. She began to wag her tail and enjoy playing with toys and food. She engaged more with me and became less terrified, both at home and out and about, including around noises.
It was enormously satisfying to see.
But as I grew and grew as a dog trainer, I realised something. When I first got Lola, I had lived with dogs all my life, so I thought I knew plenty about dogs. But when she came to us, I realised that I really knew nothing at all.
So it was an amazing journey for me. As well as being my heart dog, Lola really was the dog who taught me everything — everything I know. I am very grateful to her for that, even though she is no longer with us.
I qualified as a dog trainer and then, naturally, I wanted to use my skills with more dogs than just Lola. I wanted to spread the love. At that stage, I did not really want to get involved commercially. I was still working, so I was doing it as a hobby, but I did want to improve my skills.
I asked at the local dog shelter whether I could volunteer there, with a specific interest in playing with the dogs, training them, and doing enrichment with them. They let me start, and I have now been volunteering there for about six years.
I get to spend lots of time with the dogs: grooming them, walking them, playing with them in the runs, and especially doing lots of enrichment to increase their confidence. I also use games to train them and help prepare them for adoption.
I also spent about five years very involved in the adoption programme, supporting almost every adopter with their dog. That meant helping the dogs as they moved out of the shelter and supporting them post-adoption. I also worked as a dog trainer with some of the new adopters, helping the dogs settle into their new homes.
It has been massively rewarding.
Of course, I gained tonnes of experience from all the different kinds of dogs, with all their different struggles, breeds, ages, and backgrounds. Pretty much anything and everything you can imagine can be found among dogs in a shelter.
I then started taking on some one-to-one clients when I could fit it in with the rest of my life.
During those years, I also started to learn about Tellington TTouch, which is a lovely way of working with humans and dogs. It works on the nervous system, helping to balance the animal or person mentally and physically. It can be very calming, and it helps build a lovely rapport with your companion animal. It is just a really lovely way to work.
Slowly, slowly, I have been gaining knowledge and experience in that field, and I am now delighted to say that I am a qualified TTouch practitioner. I am very much enjoying that.
I am also about six months into an 18-month Level 6 canine behaviour diploma, which will qualify me as a dog behaviourist.
So, hopefully, in the future, I will be able to bring together my expertise in training dogs, my understanding of their behavioural struggles, and TTouch, to help balance their nervous systems.
I have really gone through an evolution: from having pulmonary hypertension, to no longer being able to work in the way I once did, to coming out the other side after transplant, and then having to step away from my previous career because of the risk to myself. Through all of that, I found a new passion, and that passion is now leading me towards a whole new career.
I hope this can motivate some of you to look around and see what other things you could be interested in, and where else life could take you.
There is definitely much more to life than the job you are currently doing, or the job you were doing before diagnosis.
The one thing I would say is that there are, of course, risks to working with animals. I never clean out the kennels where the dogs live. I work with them outside. I am very careful not to let them lick my face. I wash my hands rigorously after every dog, and I make sure I do not put my hands in my mouth. That is to avoid contamination from bacteria they may have in their mouths, on their coats, or in general dirt.
So you do have to be careful when working with animals. But you can stay safe if you are sensible and do not put yourself at unnecessary risk.
If you are looking at a career change, or if you have already made one, do let me know in the comments below.
Thank you.