Welcome to Monday morning, faithful blog readers. I can see (by looking at my counter statistics) that my daily readership has gone up quite a bit since Thursday night. I guess a few more people have become interested since I received my transplant!
So, there is not too much to tell this early in the day. I was having a little pain in my calf yesterday, so they did a scan to make sure there was not a blood clot. The nurse told me that it was all clear and that there were no clots in my leg. This is good. I have been walking around a lot, so I did not expect there to be any problems.
My blood pressure was 139/66 this morning. I am not sure if they are giving me any medication for that yet or not. It has been fluctuating up and down a little bit around that point since the transplant. They weighed me this morning, and I was 80.3 kg, which is the heaviest I have ever been. This is a result of the anti-rejection medications, especially the steroids, but that should get better as that dosage gets reduced.
I have a central line in my neck that was placed for emergency blood transfusions during surgery but was never used. They had it hooked up until yesterday to put in my IV fluids. They removed the IV Saturday, but left the line in to draw blood. This morning, however, the central line did not work so they had to do a stick in my arm. I am hoping that they will remove this central line from my neck, as it is not the most comfortable thing you can have installed.
I am feeling pretty good today. I am hoping that since it is Monday, we will see the post-transplant nephrologist and he can start talking to us about what to do once we go home (which should be on Tuesday). As of this point, I don't know if we will go home or if we will try to stay at a hotel in the area. We have to come to this hospital here in Fort Worth for the next two weeks (on Mon, Wed, and Fri) and I don't know if we want to drive the whole hour down here that many times. We will have to see. The insurance was supposed to have an allowance set up to allow us to stay in a hotel, but I don't remember exactly how to access it. We will have to talk to the social worker today or tomorrow and find out if she learned anything about it.
Well, hopefully, breakfast will be here soon and I will get to eat. I enjoyed having yogurt for the first time in over a year yesterday. I hope I ordered some more for today. It was really very good, and I know I have been missing my dairy products. I had cheese on my sandwich for lunch yesterday, and I had some pudding for supper. Mmm.
Well, not more posting for this morning. I will try to update again if anything else happens. If you want to call this hospital room, the number is 817-922-2817, and I should be here until probably Tuesday.
Thanks for coming by to read!
460) Annual Update
4 years ago
10 comments:
Hello Nathan,
I was sent your blog thru my sister, Kathi Roberts, who I guess was at dialysis with you.
I think people don't realize what those on dialysis go thru until reading something like this blog. It's great that you have written it.
My prayers are with you in your healing, and as you said hopefully there won't be anything wrong with this new kidney. I believe everyone should be an organ donor is at all possible. I am.
PLease keep my sister in your prayers. She is going thru a difficult stage right now but needs to be strong and hanging on. The good Lord is by her side.
Thanks for sharing your story.
Karen
What a joyous day! I am so glad to get caught up on the news. To God be the Glory! I pray that your quality of life will be so much better now. Get well soon and enjoy eating that yogurt!
Abby Jo (Skutt) Lee
Nathan,
I hope so happy for you and your wife. What a blessing you have received. You give hope to the rest of us! You are in my thoughs and prayers for a complete recovery!
LeighAnn Gooden
Dear Nathan and Jenny,
I was so overwhelmed with your email that I wept for joy knowing what an awesome God we have.
I haven’t been feeling to well lately and haven’t been keeping up with my emails.
WOW, Mr. Transplant man you must be up on cloud nine knowing that you don’t have to sit in that chair for four hours anymore. Praise the Lord for his awesome care for us and how he never leaves our side.
I have thought of you often and I sure did miss the friends I acquired from the TWT gang. I would always ask Leo how you were doing and just this past Friday I had such a strong feeling that you had or were about to receive a new kidney soon. Call it intuition or what but when I read your email it kind of freaked me out realizing the strong feeling that I had Friday night.
I would always ask Leo how you were doing and I hope he would relay my message of a quick hello to you all.
Hey we had a little excitement here on the MWF shift. You might have seen it in the paper a couple of weeks ago. We had a stunt man named Kevin Bode coming to our center and the Dallas morning news was there one night and photographers the following night.
I guess we have to have a little excitement once in a while.
Leo got part of his head in the picture they put in the paper so he was going around giving everyone his autograph on a blank piece of paper.
Friday night was Kevin’s last night at our dialysis center and he was on his way back to California. He recently completed a commercial he did for Toyota and I think it will air next month.
He hasn’t been on dialysis very long and I guess he will begin his transplant proceedings at UCLA medical center. He gave us a poster of himself and even took a picture with us as well as all the nurses. He was really a sweet person. I am going to forward your blog to him and maybe it will help to encourage him and give him faith to know that all things are possible with God.
I couldn’t wait to forward your email to the people that had come to visit me from my church while I was on dialysis they will all lift you up in prayer, and pray that you will heal quickly and that God will keep you strong and continue to heal you.
Hey guess what I finally have graduated and got that stupid perma cath out two weeks ago. Wow I must have stayed in the shower at least a good hour. I swore I would never take another sponge bath again.
I am still on suspension as far as the transplant list goes. I need to go to have an angiogram tomorrow morning as I have been having more shortness of breathe and chest pain so they want to make sure nothing is going on with the stent they put in. I know that someday the Lord will have a donor for me as well but that it will be in His time and not might.
I will continue to lift you and Jenny up in pray and I know that the Lord will have wonderful things in store for you.
But Peter said, "I do not possess silver and gold, but what I do have I give to you: In the name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene-walk!" And with a leap, he stood upright and began to enter the temple with them, walking and leaping and praising God.
Acts 3:6,
So Nathan now leap for you are a testimony for Our Lord.
Yours in Christ,
Kathi Roberts
Hey Nathan, I'm really glad to hear that you got the transplant and that you're doing so well. All of your old pals from CSEG are wishing the best for you.
nmccart-
Funny how I still remember the comp logins :) I havent read your blog in a few months but I got news today from Chap about what has happened.
You probably already know this, but there are people in places you probably didnt realize that pray for you. I am going to go back and catch up on your life through your blogs, and hopefully someday I will see you healthy with my own eyes my friend.
Collin
hey man, it's joey! i just got a bulletin from ronika on myspace. the lord works in mysterious ways because i was just thinking of you the other day! i did not know you were suffering from health problems. i'm so sorry to hear that. i'm glad you've found a positive channel to share through, however. i think that's remarkable! i hope you are doing well now that you have received a transplant. i must say, i'm still a little shocked to find out about you this way, but i'll be checking in on you now. god bless you, my friend! joey lipe
i actually know what its like to have an iv in my neck. i hope they take it out too! good luck man!
little ignorance here, hope you don't mind my question -
Can you not have diary while on dialysis? Is that why you're so thrilled to have yogurt?
I hope everything continues to go well for you - you remain in my prayers -
hbk
Um, I meant "dairy" not "diary". I was tired.
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