Checking the Bucket List

Annie McCall, 72, of Victoria, Australia (Oz), was diagnosed with pulmonary hypertension (PH) in 2014. She is a retired sheep farmer and district nurse. Her passions include softball, travel, gem hunting and her family.

By Annie McCall

I made a bucket list in my 40s of the places I wished to travel. I crossed Africa off the top of my list when I went with my daughter and a bunch of friends. It was everything that I dreamed of since seeing the film “Hatari!” when I was 12.

I crossed more items off my list when my cousin Angie and I visited the Greek Islands and toured Bulgaria by car. My late husband and I holidayed in Bali, China, Singapore, Malaysia and Java because going from West Australia to Asia was more affordable than other destinations.

When I was a farmer in my 20s, it was my dream to go caravanning across Australia when I retired. When I met my partner Danny in my late 40s, it was his dream too, and his hobby of gem hunting became mine. Each year, Danny and I camp in our van and go north during the winter to dig for gems all around Oz. We have found zircons, opals, garnets, citrine, topaz, aventurine, quartz and more.

All of my trips and activities are arranged around my sports. I play softball two or three times a year with a team 300 km (186 miles) away.

I have flown from Queensland to play softball and left Danny digging for gems.

Play ball

I’ve played softball most of my life. I started a team of farmer wives when I lived in Esperance. My team played for 10 years before we won gold. I discovered masters softball in the early 2000s.

My two daughters, Chelle and Cindy, are over 35 and occasionally play on my team. We played in Sydney and New Zealand for the World Masters and in Tasmania for the Oz masters. My weekly softball game is 75 kilometers (47 miles) away. Chelle and my grandkids play with me, so I make a day of it. It’s a lovely catch-up with them.

I also play tennis three times a week with an over-50s group in the nearest town, Mount Beauty. Every year Cindy and I meet in Melbourne at the Australian Open to see the final matches. It costs more than an overseas holiday, but it’s worth it.

Unheard-of diagnosis

In 2014, I played in the Victorian Masters Softball in June with no problems. When we started our local season in October, I was suddenly breathless. By November, I could not walk or go up inclines without stopping for breath.

I had two occasions of extreme breathlessness in the 1990s. One was when I climbed Mount Augustus in Western Australia with my uncle Geoff. The other time was after white water rafting on the Zambezi

River in Africa, and we had to climb out of a canyon.

After those instances, I continued to play sports, dig for gems, garden and travel. I had no problems visiting the Peruvian Alps and Galapagos Islands in 2013.

When I visited my general practitioner about my breathlessness, he said there was nothing wrong with my lungs. I thought it might be my heart. I went to a new GP for an echocardiogram and the scan showed mild PH. I was 67. The GP told me it was nothing serious, but the internet told me I’d be dead in three years — or seven years with medication.

By this time, I had contacted the Pulmonary Hypertension Association Australia (PHAA). The support group recommended that I ask my GP for a referral to a PH specialist in Melbourne, seven hours away by public transport.

I made an appointment at The Alfred hospital in Melbourne. My right heart catheterization, lung function test and ventilation-perfusion scan showed severe idiopathic pulmonary arterial hypertension (IPAH). I commenced Opsumit and warfarin in September 2015.

Returning to sport and travel

After a few weeks, my exercise capability returned, and I played tennis three times a week. Exercise makes me feel better. If I wake up with nausea, flushing or headache, I take a Panadol and go to tennis as planned. It makes the side effects pass quicker.

PH has not changed my life too much. But my overnight visits to Melbourne every three months have taken a toll. I am lucky that Angel Flight, free transportation for medical treatment, now flies from Mount Beauty to Melbourne in one hour.

Since my diagnosis, more meds have been added, making PAH a chronic disease. I no longer regard myself as having a fatal disease. I consider myself very lucky to take oral trepostinil after participating in a clinical trial because that medication isn’t available in Oz.

I continued to travel. In 2017, Danny and I took a cruise and toured Vietnam, Cambodia and Singapore. It was a fantastic experience. In 2018, my daughter, Cindy, and I took my son to Uluru in central Oz. I also glamped across the top end of Arnhem Land in northern Oz and traveled to Fiji with Danny.

Then 2020 happened. I had wanted to go through my bucket list items more quickly because of my diagnosis, but the pandemic stopped all that. I had organized a trip with my sister-in-law in September to cruise Galapagos one more time with my PH specialist’s OK. But I may have to be happy that I’ve done it once.

Hopefully sport will start soon, and I can visit my family in Queensland again. I’m really happy with the trips that we have already done, and I’m glad we took the opportunity to do them before we got too old. Just do it, I say!