Thursday, January 18 - Update

Welcome to my blog, following my chronicles as a Polycystic Kidney Disease sufferer and a recent kidney transplant patient. My story has several chapters, and the one I am currently on is titled: "Post Transplant: or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Kidney."

We went to Fort Worth to receive our transplant, because that is where the cadaver organ was sent. It is a little over 50 miles away from our home, so that makes for a long drive with follow-up appointments. This would not normally be a problem, except that we live in Texas. For those of you with access to the Weather Channel, you will know that ice and snow have been blowing through the area since late last week. Now, of course, that is "Dallas" snow and ice. So, for those of you up north, what it means is that it is cold and rained, and then the road froze. This scares most drivers to death, making the roads much more hazardous than they would have been if I lived somewhere that actually knew how to deal with snow and had drivers that learned to drive in it (more than once or twice a year).

I say all that to say, we decided to stay in Fort Worth for a while. We have follow-up appointments at the hospital until the staples come out of my incision (I think). This is normally about two or three weeks worth of appointments, three times a week. They draw blood at each appointment and verify that all of my anti-rejection medications are being given in the right amounts. If not, they can dynamically adjust my medications on a regular basis to give me the best chance to keep my kidney.

So, it's Thursday, and I am blogging from a hotel. The Fort Worth Stock Show is in town, so we had to find a room with no cows in it. It's not bad, but the mooing might get to be a little much at night, we will have to wait and see. We will stay the night and go to our appointment in the morning and then head back home. But, we will return next week for another full week of hotel stays and mooing (or not, I think the Rodeo finishes this weekend).

I don't know how long we will have to come down here, but it should not be a problem. The insurance company will "help out" a little with the cost, so that should be nice. And, I should get my paperwork next week (or sometime) to fill out my information for Short Term Disability. This way, I can still get a little money while I am not working. I am hoping to be released to do part time work from home eventually, so that I can start getting back in to everything.

Well, thanks for reading. I will try and post again tomorrow, but probably not until we get home. Maybe I will have some good information, lab report wise, since I know you all were starting to miss those from my old dialysis reports.

See you tomorrow!