Christine Griffiths: Official Site

Photo: Jim Weatherill

Tropical Passion

This heading should probably read “Athletic passion” because that’s certainly Christine Griffiths’ life purpose, but pursuing her major ambition has come at a (somewhat crippling) cost.

Our local sports ‘meteor’ recently went public with her plea for donated funding to compete in Bangkok’s forthcoming 16th World Transplant Games.

Restricted to international athletes who have undergone one of modern medicine’s miracles, 100 Australians compete in the biennial Transplant Games. These are run for dedicated athletes who refuse to let major bodily ailments interrupt their life passion.

Nurse Christine will take leave from her work at the Bone Marrow Donor Institute House in Blackwood Street, North Melbourne, to compete in Bangkok’s race walking and sprinting, long jump, table tennis and tennis IF she can gather just under $5000 for fares and accommodation in the Games city.

And her prowess is a sure bet: at the last Transplant Games held in Canada’s London, Ontario, Christine – at 56 – won gold in
the table tennis doubles and bronze in the singles.

“There were no medals in my other events, but that was to be expected,” she admits, frowning. “I had big ventilation problems back then, what with only 50 per cent lung capacity, so the 3-kilometre race walk, road run and mixed doubles tennis were no-go.”

Given her medical history, colleagues probably decry her planned heavy exercise in the tropics; nearly 20 years ago Christine had a bone marrow transplant to overcome chronic myeloid leukaemia and, while the CML was relieved, all cancers – and most treatments – compromise other body parts and there have been ensuing problems.

But there’s no holding this lady down. Her recent application to the City of Melbourne for its Active Melbourne grant of $2000 for sports people would be delivered over 12 months and used to highlight the benefits of her active lifestyle to patients and their associates in both her institute’s treatment house and the wider community.

“I’ve just got a job teaching the COTA (Council on the Ageing) program Living Longer, Living Stronger at Lifestyle Williamstown gym and there is plenty of full-time work elsewhere, but my medicos want me to work only eight hours per week. “This whole thing stresses me out so much, what with the training, and the funding and the money-raising,” she groans, “but I hope to go to the Beijing Olympics as a volunteer in ‘O8, so that’s the next goal.”

And you can bet Christine’s next project will be promoting the 18th World Transplant Games: they’ll be held on the Gold Coast 9-17 August 2009.
Full info on Christine’s Bangkok sponsorship case can be found on www.christinegriffiths.com.

Katrina Kincade-Sharkey

JUNE 2007 :: North and West Melbourne News

Christine Griffiths, volunteer at the 12th FINA World Championships.
Melbourne, March 17 – April 1, 2007:

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From The Melbourne Yarra Leader – 28th June, 2006

AGAINST THE ODDS
Maria Bervanakis

THE sheer courage and determination of some people greatly inspires us all.

North Melbourne’s Christine Griffiths is one such person.

Griffiths, 57, swooped the gold in the 100m, 200m and 400m run and 3km race walk at this year’s Victoria Police and Emergency Services Games in Melbourne.

She also took gold in the open female singles of the table tennis event and silver in the open mixed doubles.

What makes Griffiths’achievement extraordinary is that she is battling a serious lung condition brought on by a bone marrow transplant she had 18 years ago.

Griffiths – a St John Ambulance volunteer – was diagnosed with leukaemia and beat the condition by undergoing the operation. Its effects have been debilitating but that has not stopped her from pursuing competitive sport. “Running was my passion. My best time was 40 minutes for a l0km event,” she said.

In September, Griffiths will compete in the Australian Transplant Games in Geelong in running, race walking, tennis and table tennis events. She represented Australia in the World Transplant Games in Canada, taking gold in the table tennis doubles and bronze in the singles.

Griffiths is this week’s Leader Sports Star.

(Photo Caption)
GREAT RETURN: Christine Griffiths wins medals in a range of sports.

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Christine Griffiths, from Melbourne Australia, carrying the Olympic Torch for the 2006 Winter Olympics.

From The Melbourne Yarra Leader – 30th November, 2005

RUNNING
SAM MORLEY

RECURRING health problems from a bone marrow transplant 18 years ago and the training regime of an elite athlete means that Christine Griffiths has to be tough.

But Griffiths, who lives and works in North Melbourne as a helper at the Bone Marrow Donor Institute, couldn’t imagine a different life.

“Running and sport has been my life for over 30 years. I guess I’m just a pig-headed and stubborn person,” she said.

Griffiths, 56 – a Melbourne Leader Sports Star nominee – recently competed at 2005 World Transplant Games in Canada, finishing fifth both in the 3000m road race and road walk.

She also competed in the super seniors’ category for table tennis, winning gold in the doubles and bronze in the singles.

But Griffiths’ hardest battle has been her health, with problems continually interfering with her training and lifestyle.

“I have to take 31 tablets a day,” she said.

“I’m continually getting sick and getting well. In my training I’ve always got to find a happy medium.”

“I got sick before these games and I couldn’t believe it. But I said ‘stuff it all, I’m still going to go’.”

Griffiths received a bone marrow transplant in 1988, just one year before she set the world record for the 3000m track run in the 1989 World Transplant Games.

Since then she has competed in four games, claimed 12 international medals and more than 100 Australian title medals.

Griffiths has also been chosen as one of eight Australians to carry the Olympic torch at the Winter Olympics in Italy in January.

“The awards aren’t important to me, but the competing is,” she says.

“Competetion has kept me alive, it has given me a focus in my life because it didn’t matter how sick I was, I would always go out and run.”

Griffiths is unsure about whether she will compete at the 2007 World Transplant games in Thailand.

“I’ll take life as it comes, there are a lot of hard blows, but it doesn’t bother me because I’m a person who’s always on the go,” she said.

From the Waverely Leader: June 29, 2004

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CHRISTINE Griffiths was diagnosed with chronic myeloid leukemia 16 years ago.The news came as a complete shock, she said.

After extensive chemotherapy treatment and a bone marrow transplant, Ms Griffiths began a long road to recovery. The major recovery phase took about one year, but the fight for optimal health is never ending, she said. “There have been many hiccups on the way, but I am still alive,” she said.

Ms Griffiths lives and works as a nurse at the Bone Marrow Donor Institute Accommodation Centre in North Melbourne. The institute supports people receiving treatment for bone marrow transplants and associated cancers with accommodation and care. It is currently fundraising with the help of the institute’s Waverley branch. The branch has arranged proceeds from the Waverley Theatre’s next production, Same Time Next Year, to go to the institute.

Two six-day trips to Canberra in September and October organised by the branch will also help raise funds for the institute. The cost of the trip is from $625 a person, twin share. When Ms Griffiths was diagnosed with leukemia she was a residential college nurse and spent most of her recovery time living at a La Trobe University College.

“It was very difficult, as I was sharing with a person who was doing a masters degree,” she said.

“I was looking after myself and because of this I spent most of the first year after the transplant in hospital.”

Despite the difficult times, Ms Griffiths now enjoys sport and recently carried the Olympic torch when it came to Melbourne as part of its global tour before the Athens Olympics.

Since fighting the illness, Ms Griffiths has also become a track athlete and race walker for the World Transplant Games.

This year she plans to work as a volunteer nurse at the Athens Olympics for the equestrian event.

From The Melbourne Age – Thursday 6th May, 2004

Athletics has always been a focal point of Christine Griffiths’ life, to the point her doctors think it saved her life. After receiving a bone marrow transplant 16 years ago, she completed an amazing recovery by traveling to the World Transplant Games and winning gold.

“I was a runner before I had the transplant, and it’s really the athletics that has been one of the things that has kept me going through thick and thin.” said Ms Griffiths, 55. Having recovered from the transplant, she turned her attention to supporting people in the same position she had been in. As well as holding official roles with the Leukaemia Support Group and St John Ambulance, Ms Griffiths is the live-in manager fro the Bone Marrow Transplant House, which offers accommodation to people whose family members are receiving treatment. It was one of these guests who nominated her to carry the torch.

Ms Griffiths, who plans to volunteer at the Athens Olympics if she can find accommodation, has only one request when she runs her leg of the relay: “I just hope it’s a sunny day.”

Three silver medals – for the 3,000 metres road walk, and 1,500 and 800 metres track running events. That was the impressive tally for La Trobe graduate Christine Griffith at the recent World Transplant Games in Manchester, UK.

Ms Griffith has been living with leukemia since her diagnosis in 1988. She underwent a succesful bone marrow transplant in 1989, but the years since have been fraught with much illness.

She was part of a fifty-strong Australian team at Manchester that competed against 800 people from more than thirty-five countries. An appeal by the La Trobe University Credit Union raised $5,000 to send her to the Games.

Well-known on the Bundoora campus for her spirited determination, Ms Griffith, a resident tutor and nurse at Glenn College, trains for sporting achievement whenever she can. At last year’s Australian Transplant Games she won five gold medals.

Illness during games

Ms Griffith has a Bachelor of Arts degree in social sciences and a Diploma and Bachelor degree in education from La Trobe, as well as a Master of Nursing degree from RMIT. Despite being ill during the games and suffering from a painful hamstring injury, she went on post-game bus tours of the UK and Europe.

Thanking those who donated to the appeal to send her to Manchester, she said: ‘These were possibly my last games and I may never again have the opportunity to travel and catch up with many of the people I met. I’m glad I did it and made the best of it at the time.
‘However, seeing the next World Transplant Games will be in Australia, I might get my old determination back and compete again.’

Having a transplant improves the quality of your life, she said. ‘But it doesn’t mean you live a life like most people. I often still spend long periods unwell and in hospital.’

Ms Griffiths is now ‘looking desperately’ for a regular part-time job. Her College post reduces her rent, but does not pay. ‘I have done so many things in my life that I never dreamed I would be doing since the transplant,’ she concluded, ‘but now I would just love to get a regular job.’

Mr Doug Andrews, Manager of the La Trobe University Credit Union – which arranged for the Bone Marrow Donor Institute to visit the University recently to encourage people to join the Bone Marrow Registry – said the Transplant Games highlight the need for organ donation, the quality of life of organ recipients, and show gratitude to the families of organ donors.

Details about bone marrow donations from the Bone Marrow Institute, (03)
9342 7286.

NOVEMBER 1995 BULLETIN 16 LA TROBE UNIVERSITY

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Christine Griffiths, winner of the Gold Medal in the 3 Km Road Race. World Transplant Games, Manchester. August 14-20 1995.

Christine Griffiths is set to give Australia gold in the world transplant games in Manchester following funding for the trip by the Royal Victorian Institute for the Blind.

Christine, 46, who has a vision impairment, is Australia’s top chance in bringing back gold in several athletic events at the games held August 14-20, which attracted 1500 competitors worldwide.

“It has always been a dream of mine to compete internationally and now thanks to RVIB I’m confident of improving on the form I had at the Australian transplant games last year,” said Christine.

She collected a string of gold medals and in the world transplant games she is tackling the 200, 800 and 1500m on the track and the 3000m road walk and the 3000m road run.

Christine will join up to 60 Australian competitors for the transplant games, aimed at making people aware of the need for more organ donors while showing the benefits gained.

“Transplant recipients are able to enjoy quality of life thanks to families of organ donors,” she said.

Christine, who received a bone marrow transplant in 1988 after suffering leukemia, is learning computer skills at RVIB.

RVIB (Royal Victorian Institute for the Blind) newsletter. 1995.