Thank you for taking the time to read Clodagh’s story.

Clodagh is my beautiful 20-year-old sister who has been diagnosed with Stage 2 Lipoedema - a medical condition which predominately affects women and is a chronic fat and connective tissue disorder. It typically affects the thighs, buttocks, lower legs and/or arms and leads to tissue enlargement which disfigures the body by causing swelling. The associated pain also severely impacts on mobility, daily living activities and psychosocial wellbeing.

Few doctors and health care professionals are trained to diagnose Lipoedema, this means countless women are misdiagnosed and left untreated. Just to obtain a correct diagnosis has been an extremely long process for us and Clodagh’s condition has only worsened throughout. 

Clodagh used to be such a strong, confident, happy and out-going young woman. She loved life, loved spending time with friends and absolutely loved to sing. The person Clodagh is today is not my sister. She describes herself as feeling empty and like she is trapped in someone else’s body. She cries every single day because of the pain she is in. She forces herself to get up each morning to go to work and hides away in her room every night. It is affecting her quality of life, and she is becoming very depressed. Each day she is finding it harder to cope with as the pain is increasingly getting worse. Seeing her in this much pain both physically and mentally is heart-breaking.

Before

After

We have exhausted the resources and available medication that the NHS can provide and our GP has applied for funding from the NHS Clinical Commissioning Group, but this has recently been rejected. Our only option now is a complex liposuction which entails 6 separate surgeries on the majority of Clodagh’s body which unfortunately is not available on the NHS. This surgery will be carried out by a private clinic in Birmingham that specialises in Lipoedema at a total sum of £70,000.

Clodagh is losing hope, without this operation she will most likely be in a wheelchair by the time she is 30 as she simply will not be able to walk. Given her age, medical experts have advised that she has unfortunately progressed to a higher stage of lipoedema at a younger age than most women would.

Although we are doing everything we can, we desperately need help to raise the funds in hope of being able to carry out the operations as soon as possible. Although this condition is not life threatening at this stage, you will be saving her life.

It is also vital that we raise awareness of the condition itself. We have learnt through support groups that so many women have struggled to obtain medical help through misdiagnosis.

We would be so grateful if you could share this as much as possible and donate anything you can, that will make such a huge difference. 

Thank you,

Natasha x