A year ago Canowindra's Scott Preston was on stage raising money for Beyond Blue while dressed as a drag queen but a rapid degeneration of his hip means he can no longer walk up the stage steps.
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After months of living in excruciating pain, the 48-year-old who works at James Sheahan Catholic High School in Orange as an IT technician, is now counting down the days until he gets a full-hip replacement at Dudley Private Hospital on March 8.
The surgery is due to the generosity of friends, colleagues and former students who raised $30,000 in a matter of weeks through a GoFundMe page set up by Peter Hargraves.
"Scotty and I are pretty good mates, we see him a lot around school and we could see the pain starting to build," Mr Hargraves said.
"In the last couple of months he was using a cane and we thought this is bad.
"We got to $20,000 after one week."
Mr Hargraves said he started the GoFundMe page after Mr Preston refused a personal donation.
"Scotty is a legend, not only in our school anyone who has met him knows he's a legend," he said.
Mr Preston said he was planning on withdrawing the money from his superannuation when Mr Hargraves set up the GoFundMe page that saw several people donate $1000 for the operation.
Mr Preston said he uses a cane to walk from his car to his office but the school has also provided him with a mobility scooter to use around the grounds.
"The whole experience has been humbling," he said.
He said his GP diagnosed the hip degeneration last year due to arthritis and the problem got "really bad" in October.
Despite his pain, Mr Preston said the hip replacement was classed as elective surgery and he would have to wait 12 months through his private health fund or close to 18 months through the public health system.
He is urging people with private health cover to check the conditions after he only discovered his plan did not cover it when he needed it.
Mr Preston said he had health cover for 18 years that covered himself, his wife Teresa and three children Tom, Riley and Mackenzie. However, the only difference between the level he was on and the next level up was joint replacement surgery.
"Never in my wildest dreams did I think I would need a hip replacement," he said.
He said he paid for the next plan when he realised joint replacement was not covered but at Christmas the insurer told him he would have to wait 12 months.
"By Christmas time I could hardly walk with it," Mr Preston said.
"It was a bit of a kick in the guts and I couldn't move."
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