TaeKwonDo - It's more than a sport - it's a Way of Life

If you want to contact me email
is knight-of_valor@webtv.net

LAWRENCE RAY HOLT. Born April 27, 1950 in the small East Texas Town of Center, the Knight has four children and 9 grandchildren - plus some not by birth but in spirit.

I was re-born January 13, 2007. No, not a religeous rebirth but a physical one. For about seven years I was in deteriorating health due to Interstitial Pulmonary Fibrosis. My life seemed to be over, my prognosis was not good. It was doubtful that I even had a future. I decided that if I had to go down I would to go down fighting. I exercised all I could and stayed as active as possible because my doctors said that was the only way to slow the progression of my disease. I was still losing ground to my deadly enemy though and was capable of less and less until I could do little or nothing. I had to give up my Taekdondo classes in November of 06. The class room was up stairs and I could no longer climb stairs. When I had to teach the last class sitting down that told me it was past time to take a vacation. About this time I got on the Lung Transplant List at Baylor University Medical Center in Dallas Tx. I had to move closer to Dallas so I went to live with my daughter Kalin in Marshal Tx. All I had to do then was wait for the call. My lungs were so bad I had to use two bottles of oxygen at once. I had one canula in my nose and the other in my mouth just to be able to walk to the bathroom but I was determined I was NOT going to lie in bed to be waited on hand and foot and cleaned up like a baby. It took me a half hour to get out of bed in the morning. I slept twelve to fourteen hours a day and sat on the couch in front of the tv the rest of the time while Kalin and her kids brought me whatever I needed. I was near helpless, unable to do much of anything for myself. I managed to do some light, sitting exercises was all I was capable of but I did them up till two days before my transpant. My parents were in their eighties and they were in better shape than I was. The call finally came from Baylor at 6 AM January 13, 2007 - they had a potential donor. The ride to Dalllas was hectic, Kalin drove 85 and 90 miles an hour to get me there in time. A 911 call kept the Highway patrol off us but there were a few morons who seemed to take delight in moving in front of us and slowing us down. We had a two hour deadline. Kalin drove within a couple of feet of the rear of these people and laid on the horn till they got out of the way;. She got me to the hospital in time and held herself together until they took me into surgery - then she lost it. Sha had the hard part - she had to wait and worry while they did the surgery. My part was so easy I slept through the whole thing. Just after they took me into surgery Kalin was walking down the aisle bawling her little eyes out. An older gentleman by the name of Wayne Moses who had had a lung transplant three years earlier took her under his wing. He calmed her down and took care of her till her husband got there, then the three of them waited until I came out of surgery. I woke the next day or maybe it was a couple days later, I'm not sure. The next few days are a blur but from then on till now has been a whole new life. Going into surgery was like a little death and coming out was a new birth. The first day after I got out of ICU They got me up for a walk and I could barely make twenty feet. Leaning on a little slip of a girl named Neesa and sucking oxygen still I gasped like a freight train the whole way. As my body accepted the new lung I gradually cut down on the oxygen and was able to do more and more. Two months later I had completed a twelve week rehab coarse in 8 weeks by walking a mile on a treadmill in a half hour and by walking 1400 feet of hallway in 6 minutes. I was able to do this because I had went in stronger than most lung transplant patients. I attrubute that to my years of TaeKwonDo training and the discipline I gained to keep exercising until two days before the transplant. I drove about 180 miles home the next day. Now six months later I'm moving on with my new life. I walk two miles a day three days a week and I lift weights another three days a week. I'm easing back into TaeKwonDo workouts. I'm up to doing about half as much as everyone else. When I get too out of breath to do a drill or a form I stop and help someone else while I rest.

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