07-05-2025
Attorney walks in Lung Force Walk to inspire others after his journey: "There was a reason why God spared me"
Lung Force Hero Mark Sheppard has new lease on life after double lung transplant
Lung Force Hero Mark Sheppard has new lease on life after double lung transplant
Lung Force Hero Mark Sheppard has new lease on life after double lung transplant
Mark Sheppard loves to be in nature.
"It's really become a special place for us. It allows me to really contemplate and meditate on how lucky I am."
He's often on local trails near his Wayne, Pennsylvania, home with furry sidekicks Chase and Ruthie.
But his journey to get here was anything but a walk in the park.
"I was diagnosed in early 2017 with what's called idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis," Sheppard said.
It's a rare, incurable illness that scars over the lungs.
Mark Sheppard was tetherered to an oxygen machine after being diagnoses with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, a disease that causes scarring in the lungs.
Mark Sheppard
Dr. Albert Rizzo, who did not treat Sheppard, explains further.
"Really what the scarring does, it makes the lungs stiffer and very hard for oxygen to get into the bloodstream, which brings to those symptoms of the shortness of breath, the cough, inability to really do too much activity," said Rizzo, chief medical officer for the American Lung Association.
The diagnosis came as a shock to Sheppard.
"I would plateau for a while, and then my lung function would drop precipitously. And then I would plateau, then it would drop," Sheppard said.
By 2019, the lawyer-by-trade was tethered to an oxygen machine. Then his lungs failed in October of 2020.
Doctors intubated him after he said his goodbyes to his family.
"I woke up, two or three weeks later. My wife was sitting there and I asked her, 'Where'd you park? Let's get out of here."
"I didn't know that I had a transplant," Sheppard said.
And a bilateral lung transplant at that – in other words, two new lungs thanks to an organ donor.
The transplant quite literally breathed air back into the dad of two's life.
For starters, he can walk the dogs again while also enjoying time with his growing family.
"I'm going to be a grandfather in a couple of months. My daughter's expecting our first [grandchild], and I keep getting reminded she got married a year and a half ago. I got to walk her down the aisle — something I never thought I would do," said Sheppard.
The soon-to-be "Pop Pop" is forever grateful to his team at the University of Pennsylvania, and of course, the donor and his family.
"I came out of it sort of with a renewed sense of purpose, and there was a reason why I was still here, and there was a reason why God spared me," Mark said. "It was my job, I thought, to try to figure out what that was."
Nikki DeMentri: Have you figured it out?
Mark Sheppard: No, but i'm working on it.
In the nearly five years since the transplant, Sheppard has thrown himself into giving back, whether that be through pro bono legal work or through organizations like the American Lung Association.
This year will mark his fourth Lung Force Walk.
"Medicine is advancing in ways that are truly amazing, and that if you can stay alive long enough and do what your doctors say and try to stay as strong and healthy as you can, hopefully, the medicine will catch up. And that's exactly what happened for me," Sheppard said.
He walks because someone gave him the chance to do so once again.
