Living with End Stage Renal Failure

I had been feeling somewhat sick and went to the VA for a checkup. I then went on vacation to Houston Texas to visit my cousin. Even though I was not feeling well I had my granddaughter with me and I put forth my best effort to enjoy my visit. On a Friday evening while attending a high school football game, I received a call from my doctor who informed me that I should get to the emergency room as soon as possible because my kidney function was only 25%. I did not heed her advice and informed her that I would be back in New Jersey on the following Monday. She gave me warnings and instructions and I was at her office two hours after touching down.

My doctor checked me out and informed me that I now only had 10% kidney function. She called for an ambulance and transported me from Lyons VA to the emergency room at East Orange VA. I was placed in the ICU and that is when it hit me how very serious this was. They decided that a kidney biopsy would be in order to find out exactly what caused this. I was a very healthy man. I jogged three miles a day at ten minutes per mile. I worked out with weights three times a week and did crunches a hundred at a time. This could be attested by sculpted body and an appearance that did not reveal my years.

During the biopsy the student doctor made an oops and broke the shell on my kidney. I will tell you that I have been shot, cut, stabbed, hit by a car, blown up, and hit in the head with a baseball bat, but never have I felt pain like I felt from the injury to my kidney. Even with a morphine drip I wailed through the night. And yes, I prayed, begged and made deals with God if only He would relieve the agony I was in. Eight days in the ICU and I made it through.

Now it was time to begin my new life. They cut a hole in my neck and placed a catheder in it and I had my first taste of Hemodialysis. Four hours of sitting in a chair watching TV and wondering how I was going to deal with this. I was finally released from the hospital and began treatment at a Davita clinic. God this thing in my neck was uncomfortable.

I was settling into the routine waiting to have this thing taken out of my neck and a shute placed in my arm. But things would not go that easily for me. I contracted a staff infection that landed me back in the hospital and its ICU for another twelve days. Another brush with death that I survived. After this incident I continued to get infections in the neck site so they could not place the shute in my arm while there was an active infection in my body. The doctors told me my options and I was glad I had one.

I was introduced to Peritanial Dialysis and it has been a good fit so far. I have some complications from time to time because it seems I am very succesible to infections. I've had a few in the two years I've been on. But all in all it is a very acceptable treatment for me. I am on the machine ten hours a day and it is done mostly at night. I go on at ten o'clock at night and come off at eight o'clock in the morning. doesn't affect my life to much at all.

Peritanial Dialysis is very functional and I have adapted well. I have been on two cruises and numerous weekend outings. They deliver my supplies directly to the ship and all I have to do is carry my machine, which has a handy carrying case. For the weekends I just load up my supplies and machine and off we go. It makes me leave the casinos a bit earlier since I don't want to be tied down to the machine all day. All and all, not a bad deal.

I am now doing all the final work toward getting on a transplant list. I have just had a liver biopsy to make sure all is well with that organ. So now it is a waiting game and I don't have anything but time since I'm on medical retirement. Money gets a bit funny sometimes since I only get 60% of my former pay and a small SSD check.

I have a wonderful mate who gives me all the love a man could ever ask for. We had real plans before this thing happened and they have had to be put on indefinite hold for now. She doesn't want a lot but we were planning on buying a modest home in Delaware and living out our golden years traveling and loving one another. But as was stated in Michael Moore's documentary, "Sicko", illness in America can leave you on the pauper's list. Even with a prescription plan the co-pays are a killer for my medicines. The fact that I can't fulfill my love's dream is more pain to me than this disease could ever be. But I believe that God will make a way. I continue to pray that something will change our fate.

So there you have it. My life as it stands and all the toils and tribulations, hopes and wishes that is my life. Please one and all, keep us in your prayers and I believe that "this to shall passs.