Courageous transplant boy Max Johnson has told of his despair as he waited for his new heart - and how he once ‘yanked’ out a wire attached to the machine keeping him alive.

The nine-year-old from Winsford was desperately ill for months with cardiomyopathy, which enlarged his heart, and was kept alive by a Left Ventricular Assisted Device (LVAD).

He remained on the organ transplant list for seven months at the Freeman Hospital in Newcastle before a donor for him was finally found in August.

That nine-hour transplant operation was filmed for a special BBC documentary to mark the 50th anniversary of the first heart transplant in December.

Max - who last month was declared the overall winner of the Young Person of the Year title at the Trinity Mirror-Scottish Power 30th anniversary Your Champions awards in Chester - spoke at length about his experience waiting for a donor and why he felt it was so important to support our sister paper the Mirror’s Change the Law for life campaign.

The 2017 Overall Young Person of the Year Max Johnson of Winsford receives his award from Colin Jackson, Stephen Stewart of ScottishPower and Carl Wood of Trinity Mirror
The 2017 Overall Young Person of the Year Max Johnson of Winsford receives his award from Colin Jackson, Stephen Stewart of ScottishPower and Carl Wood of Trinity Mirror

He said: “Literally every morning I would close my eyes and I would say to myself: another day, please, another day’.”

His mum Emma jokes with him: “You did not tell me that.” And Max replies: “There are a load of things I have not told you. At one point I gave up and yanked the heart wire out (connected to the machine keeping him alive). The next day you could tell because it was bleeding and woozy.

“I just thought ‘this is getting stupid - there has not been one single offer of a heart for me’. And then one week later I got the transplant.”

Speaking of the importance of organ donation, he said: “I wanted to save people’s lives because I knew what it was like.

“It was horrible.”

Both market researcher Emma, 47, and his dad Paul, 44, a civil servant, told of their gratitude to the donor family who saved their son’s life.

“We just hope that we can help raise awareness and save lives for people who are languishing on the waiting list and getting sicker,” said Emma.

Young heart transplant patient Max Johnson, aged 9, celebrates the news that Prime Minister Theresa May vows to change the law on organ donations and will call it Max's Law
Young heart transplant patient Max Johnson, aged 9, celebrates the news that Prime Minister Theresa May vows to change the law on organ donations and will call it Max's Law

And both parents fought back tears as he said: “We think of them every day. What they have done is amazing. I feel incredibly lucky that we have our little boy.

“We are so blessed someone had the courage and humanity at what I don’t doubt must have been the hardest time of their lives to give someone this chance.

“How do you say thank you for that?”

Theresa May wrote a personal letter to Max following the campaign to introduce a new ‘opt out’ law in England and Wales which will mean everyone is presumed to be an organ donor unless they opt out of the scheme.

It has already been introduced in Wales. Experts believe the new legislation could save up to 500 lives a year across the UK. In a moving interview, one Cardiff-based consultant told the Beeb how operating theatre staff wept as a little boy aged four had saved lives with her heart, liver and two kidneys.

“I have a four-year-old girl and she was asleep wearing Paw Patrol pjyamas and when they brought this little lad into theatre, he was wearing the same pjyamas as my little girl,” he said.

“That little boy had died and his family wanted some good to come from it.

Young heart transplant patient Max Johnson, aged 9, celebrating with his father Paul Johnson, at their home in Winsford
Young heart transplant patient Max Johnson, aged 9, celebrating with his father Paul Johnson, at their home in Winsford

“The next day his liver and heart were transplanted, and two kidneys have been transplanted and saved lives.”

Emma added the work of the surgeons in Max’s transplant was ‘incredible’ but that needed the courage of a donor family.

Max is enjoying a ‘phased’ return to class as he continues his recovery from his transplant. After almost a year away, he spent his first day back at St Oswald’s Church of England Primary School in Worleston helping to raise money for Children in Need.

The school put out a ‘welcome’ banner to mark his return as Max donned his favourite ‘Minion Life’ onesie - from the hit Hollywood movie Despicable Me - to mark the occasion.

After the excitement of his return to class, he completed the perfect day when he was made Overall Young Person of the Year at the 30th anniversary Trinity Mirror-ScottishPower Your Champions awards in Chester.

Max said he had been ‘really looking forward’ to getting back to school adding: “It was fantastic to get an award. I am so pleased the law is going to be changed.”

The BBC film, which has a working title of Second Chance, is due to aired next month. Christiaan Barnard, the South African cardiac surgeon, performed the world’s first human-to-human heart transplant on December 3, 1967, and the second overall heart transplant in 1964.