As of Jan 2nd, 2010 I have renal kidney failure. My transplanted kidney
from 2001 is rejectiing. After two months of being ill it was
discovered that my kidney was not responding and I was rushd to the
hospital. I went unresponsive and was put on life support and required
emergency dialysis because I was so ill. I’ve been home for three weeks
now doing dialysis three days a week in an out patient clinic. It’s not
been a great new year for me so far but things are looking up. Although
it is inevitable that I will need a new transplant and my kidney is too
damaged to make a turn around I was lucky enough to have two living
matches the first time around and my second match is willing to be
re-evaluated to donate for another transplant. We’ll be starting the
process later this month. I’m doing well, dialysis is getting better
and so we’re just taking things one day at a time.
For those interested in the full story, this is basically what
happened… Around November my significant other had the flu and when I
started feeling ill we figured it was the flu as well. Then I started
having nose bleeds, my doctor said it was because I had weak membranes
and the dry air was irritating my nose so they cauterized it. This was
actually the result of having a low platelette count and not being able
to clot. Then before Christmas I began feeling ill again and had
trouble breathing. My doctor took X-Rays and diagnosed me with pnemonia
and prescribed me zithromax. It made me sick and was very unpleasant
but I finished it just in time to enjoy Christmas but the next day my
nose started bleeding again, this time I had to go to the emergency
room where they cauterize it. Not four hours later the cauterization
broke and my nose started bleeding again so I went back to the
emergency room. This time they packed it with gauze and I had to leave
that in for three days, I took it out on New Years so I guess I had
something to be happy about this year, lol. The next day I had trouble
breathing again so I went back to my doctor and they had me do a
nebulizer treatment in the office and some blood test was ordered. I
was then sent on my way home thinking that I only need to nedbulizer
treatments a few times a day to help clear up my pnemonia. The doctor’s
office calls as soon as I get home telling me to go straight to the
emergency room because my CO2 was at a dangerous level, I’m basically
hyperventalting myself. My mom came and got me asap, while I’m in the
back room waiting for them to hook me up to oxygen the doctor on call
comes in and tells us that my oxygen level is fine, the CO2 level is up
from renal failure. It’s not pnemonia, it’s edema. My creatnine was 17
and normal level should be below 4. Not to mention all my other levels
were off the chart and since my kidney had not been working I had a
severe build up of toxins in my body. Unfortunately the local area
hospital has no dialysis unit so later that night I was taken to
another hospital via ambulance and early that morning I was thrown into
surgery to place an emergency dialysis catheter and started dialysis
later that day. The next day something happened where I went
unresponsive and they had to place an air respirator and put me on life
support. I spent five days in intensive care and another five in
general care before being discharged.
