In the hospital again

After a long week of trying to convince my dialysis nurse at the clinic that no, wearing a mask is important when your opening up someone's chest catheter, I am now hospitalised with an infection in my blood. This is very familiar to me and I'm not liking it AT ALL. I'm afraid that I will wind up just as I was last year with no hope and in the hospital for weeks on end. The vascular team keeps putting off redoing my AV graft and now they can't touch me until this infection is gone. That can take up to 6-8 weeks!

Thankfully I have a dear friend staying with us that is helping us to keep things straight and the house on some kind of routine. The boys also have their therapists now which is also making things easier.

I'm going to try to get out of this clinic before they kill me, but they are making it difficult and I'm not sure I can work around their hoops.

Medical Update

I got a lot of great news! First of all the medical stuff:

I got a phone call from my transplant coordinator and we set up my final tests to finish my profile to give to the transplant team.


My Sister in soul- Ng got a call from my Transplant coordinator as well. I don't know what it entailed, I didn't think to ask, but the fact that she got a call back means I am that much closer to being done with all this!

Now for school: I currently have a 4.0 and perfect attendance. I am also one of the class leaders it seems. I guess there is something to be said for being immensely reliable. I am planning the schools Criminal Justice social for late this spring/early summer and planning on joining the Criminal justice club and becoming a tutor.

Yes, I am doing a whole hell of a lot, but just let me say this: After so many many months of being completely inactive, this feels really good. I'm being productive and working towards a career which is something I've never had.

I've been immensely lucky while all this has been going on, I feel really good. I'm on overnight dialysis now, and it's working better than I ever had any right to think it would. It's easier on my body and I sleep fairly well while I'm there.

I hope to be updating more often than I have been, but life being what it is, I can't promise that right now.

Medical Update

  It's been a while since I've posted a medical update, and I apologize for that. Things have been rather crazy, but in a good way lately.

   After I was released from the hospital on December 8th I was the new owner of an AV graft, that is a small tube in my right forearm connected to a vein and an artery. This allows for the dialysis needles to enter both sides and draw blood and cleanse it more efficiently. The surgery was long and the healing painful, but it was finally ready 4 weeks later. In the intervening time I was again hospitalized with another catheter infection, however lucky me! The infections never left the catheter. So, thankfully they just pulled it out and that was that. I had been having some neurological symptoms, however over time they seem to have cleared up. I honestly believe it was because of the ineffectiveness of the catheter that caused them.

   So, the New Year came and went and the access is holding up -beautifully-. It's doing well enough that I have returned to college and am now on the overnight dialysis unit where I go in at 9pm and sleep there while the machine runs until 6am or so then go home.

   I cannot thank the many friends and family members who have worked to assist us in our time of need over this past holiday season, and I know that I can never ever repay that generosity except to keep paying it forward as I try to do always. I know that should anyone ever be in need..if I can help Tell Me. I will.

   I will be posting a more personal update tomorrow about how life is going outside of medical things, as well as pics of the kids ;) Stay tuned.