By Aoife Gallagher
For five hours, 32 minutes, and one second last month in Dublin, Ernesto Antonio had one thought on his mind: gratitude.
Twenty-five years ago to the very day, Galway-born Ernesto underwent life-saving surgery. This year, he ventured through the capital’s streets as one of 18,000 participants in the Irish Life Dublin Marathon, towards the finish line at Mount Street Upper, Ernesto was so grateful for his second chance.
On 27 October, 1999, Ernesto received his new heart, he will forever remember his donor – the person who made that second chance possible.
“Coming up to my 25th transplant anniversary I thought I would travel to Dublin to celebrate and I saw the Dublin Marathon was on the same day,” Ernesto told GalwayPulse.
Ernesto, now 60, decided to grasp the challenge of the 26 miles and 385 yards to celebrate the silver milestone and to honour his heart donor. Following 10 weeks of preparation, he travelled to Dublin alongside his daughter Isabella.
“I decided I have to run it, even though I had not run in two years,” Ernesto said. “I knew I would be embracing a considerably slower pace in the Dublin Marathon, but every step I took was for my heart donor. I’m forever grateful.”
The weekend held another milestone, the day before the race, Ernesto reunited with his transplant surgeon, Professor Jim McCarthy of the Mater Hospital, for the first time in 15 years. “It was great to see him and catch up,” Ernesto said.
Born and raised in Bushy Park, Rahoon, Ernesto trained to be a nurse in Ireland before moving to the UK, in the mid-1980s. There, he met his wife, Kate and his daughter Isabella was born.
Now 40 years living in the UK, having worked as a theatre charge nurse, he has previously worked in Kent and Essex with the NHS. Through the years, he worked with organ donors, experiencing the other side.
Upon retiring in 2022, Ernesto settled in Totnes, Devon, a place that feels like home away from home. Like his native Galway with the bellowing River Corrib, Totnes has its own river running through it.
“I live in Totnes- it’s a lovely town at the top of the River Dart estuary,” he said. “It’s about as close to Galway as you can get! I love being on the river and the sea it gives the same feeling of being close to Connemara.”
Reflecting on life since his transplant, Ernesto shares a story of resilience and strength, one which is centred around love for his late wife and his loving daughter. In 1999, at the age of 36, Ernesto contracted a virus while travelling, cycling through the dusty terrain of the Middle East, which eventually led to multi-organ failure requiring transplantation.
After an exhaustive search to find a compatible heart donor and eventually going under the knife when the stakes were at their highest, there were months of recovery. Having spent week upon week in hospital wards, Ernesto’s body weight dropped considerably to half of what the scales showed beforehand, to an alarming 46 kilos (101 pounds). He would have to learn how to walk and talk again. His spirit, though, never waned.
“My wife, Kate, and my daughter Isabella always gave me life to fight for.”
“I have walked, I have swam, I have cycled. However, the greatest thing about receiving the gift of life was being able to be there for my wife Kate.”
“When I was so ill in Dublin back in 1999, Kate never, ever left my side. My daughter too, Isabella. It is fantastic to see her grow up – she’s 31 now – and to see what she has achieved. Without my donor, I would never have been here to witness that and see how successful and inspiring Isabella is in her own right.”
Ernesto has completed incredible feats for both his family and his heart donor. It has been a journey from the first Transplant Games in 2000, when, in those early days, it was difficult to even get onto a bicycle, before putting the wheels in motion.
“I could barely get my leg over the crossbar,” he says. “But I finished the race.”
From those early days of not being able to walk or talk, then whilst on the road to recovery and trying to swing a leg over to get on the bike, Ernesto was finding his groove, so much so he took on, and conquered Mount Kilimanjaro – Africa’s tallest mountain and the highest free-standing mountain in the world at 5,895m above sea level – in Tanzania in 2010.
“From aiming to complete a triathlon, I was climbing Kilimanjaro,” he said.
Between 2000 and 2018, Ernesto represented Ireland at the Heart and Lung Transplant Games. The highlight of his various marathons was when he broke a world record time for a heart transplant recipient at the 2009 Dublin City Marathon, finishing it in three hours and 45 minutes.
He swam across the Channel – 21 miles of choppy waters from southern England to northern France, and marked his 15th transplant anniversary by finishing the 2014 Dublin City Marathon. Only this year, in April, Ernesto walked over 1,200 km from Cádiz in the south of Spain, through Seville, Salamanca and Zamora, to his final destination Finisterre in northwest Spain.
“It was nice to push the boundaries and show what can be achieved post-transplant,” Ernesto says. “To show the power of organ donation and the power of organ transplantation and make people aware of the need for organ donors in Ireland and the UK.”
Despite all of Ernesto’s powerful achievements, he maintains that his proudest moments are centred around the transplant enabling him to continue to be there for his family.
Breast cancer took his wife, Kate, from him in 2016, and he remains thankful for getting even that much time following his own recovery. These days, Isabella, his daughter, is his number-one supporter. They got through life, just like Ernesto did the marathon, by taking it one step at a time.
“When Kate became ill, it was good to be able to be there for her and repay her for all the care she had given me,” Ernesto adds.
“I would really like to thank the Irish Kidney Association and acknowledge all the good work they do,” Ernesto concludes. “To become an organ donor in Ireland, carry a donor card and set up the organ donor app on your phone. It’s important to have this conversation with your family and let them know you would like to be a donor. Thanks to them, I’ve seen my daughter grow up.”
“Without my donor, none of this would have been possible.” An incredible gift to give anybody.
Ernesto is currently fundraising for the Irish Kidney Association you can donate here For more information on organ donation and the Irish Kidney Association click here