Mother's Day joy for Jess after double transplant

A MOTHER will today celebrate an occasion she never imagined possible before she received a lifesaving double organ transplant.

- By Lucy Johnston SOCIAL AFFAIRS EDITOR

Jess Harris, 36, has been looking forward to spending Mother's Day with her one-year-old son, Ezra, born just four days before it last year.

And the mum, from Finchley, North London, knows this has only been made possible by the generosity of her organ donor and their family.

After being diagnosed with type one diabetes aged just 12, she suffered years of health challenges, including regular gruelling dialysis sessions and being infected with salmonella, which caused her kidneys to fail.

At one point, doctors feared she was too ill to survive a transplant if the call came.

But in 2018, Jess underwent a lifesaving double kidney and pancreas transplant in a gruelling nine-hour operation.

"I got to the point that I was too ill to have a transplant. I was in hospital all the time and within 24 hours, I'd be dragged back to A&E after being discharged," she said. "Now I can physically do things I want to do, and I want to do everything."