Falkirk deli was transplant patient Diane's dream

Diane Walker (43) has no doubt about what she enjoys most about running Di’s Deli, in Blinkbonny Road, Falkirk.

"I’m a real people person,” said Diane. “I like working here, with people coming in and giving me their life stories.”

If only customers knew the life story of the extraordinary woman serving them.

A few years ago she felt so ill with her kidney problems she got her ex-partner to promise her he was going to look after their two children – Stephanie (20) and Steven (15) – after she was gone.

Diane, originally from Grangemouth and now living in Redding, was 35 when she was diagnosed with IgA nephropathy – a kidney disease that results in inflammation that, over time, can hamper the kidneys' ability to filter waste from blood.

She was put on the transplant waiting list when she was 39 and spent eight months on dialysis as her kidneys began to fail.

Diane had been getting training on how to operate a home dialysis machine – in order for her to continue her child minding job – and was just days away from having one delivered when she got the call saying a kidney was available.

She underwent a seven-hour transplant operation at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Glasgow in 2018.

"It was two days after my 40th birthday. I said Happy Birthday Diane, here’s a kidney.”