One year after undergoing her second kidney transplant, Amanda Cullen will walk in the 14 kilometre City2Surf from Sydney's CBD to Bondi Beach on August 11.
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Ms Cullen was diagnosed with Lupus Nephritis in 1999 and due to renal failure brought on by the disease her mother donated her kidney for her first kidney transplant in 2011.
Over the years she underwent a range of treatments from high-dose steroids to chemotherapy for the Lupus and she spent three years on haemodialysis.
However, five-and-a-half years after her first transplant, Ms Cullen fell ill with double pneumonia and had to go back on dialysis for two and a half years then had a second kidney transplanted on June 24 last year.
I always watched [City2Surf] each year and never thought I'd be able to do it because I've always been unwell and been on dialysis and a lot of days struggled to get out of bed.
- Amanda Cullen
"I always watched [City2Surf] each year and never thought I'd be able to do it because I've always been unwell and been on dialysis and a lot of days struggled to get out of bed," Ms Cullen said.
"When it started [last year] it was just over a month after my second kidney transplant and I thought I'm going to do it next year and I'm going to do it to honour my donor.
"I was in hospital for around 10 to 12 days in Westmead and then I had to stay [in Sydney] for six weeks as an outpatient, it's a long time for a rural [person]."
Ms Cullen said that in that period she had to have daily blood tests and to see a doctor to make sure there were no complications and her body did not reject the kidney.
She also had a biopsy at one week, one month, three months and finally one year, with the recent biopsy coming back "all good".
"I'm tired all the time, that's something you have to learn to deal with and also I have joint pain," Ms Cullen said about her lupus symptoms.
She said medication also caused other side-affects such as arthritis but she has continued to work and is currently employed with a legal firm between three and five days a week.
In preparation for the City2Surf Ms Cullen has been walking and attending a gym but her exercise was set back when she fractured her ankle last month and had to use a moon boot.
She said for this year's City2Surf on August 11 she is planning to walk and her goal is to finish and raise awareness of organ and tissue donations and encourage people to sign up to be a donor.
Ms Cullen said Garmin Australia had paid for her entry fee into the City2Surf.
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Tanya Marschke
I am based at Orange and cover a wide range of subjects as well as the weekly business column. I've worked consistently in the the media industry since 2006 including the past seven years at the Central Western Daily. Before moving to Orange, I worked as a journalist at weekly newspapers the Beaudesert Times and the Gold Coast Sun in Queensland, as well as the Scone Advocate in the Hunter Valley. I started my career at the Ridge News in Lightning Ridge while I completed my journalism studies remotely at Charles Sturt University in Bathurst.
I am based at Orange and cover a wide range of subjects as well as the weekly business column. I've worked consistently in the the media industry since 2006 including the past seven years at the Central Western Daily. Before moving to Orange, I worked as a journalist at weekly newspapers the Beaudesert Times and the Gold Coast Sun in Queensland, as well as the Scone Advocate in the Hunter Valley. I started my career at the Ridge News in Lightning Ridge while I completed my journalism studies remotely at Charles Sturt University in Bathurst.
