Not So Daily Updates - Made Of Money...

As you've probably guessed, I have another excuse to blame on my tardiness with posting; this one should be fairly acceptable though, actually, I wouldn't tarnish this one by making it out as an excuse. Outside of being an ESRD kidney failure patient, I felt it relevant, on this occasion, to do a write up about my Mother.

Mom's life, as I can remember, or have been told.

I honestly have the WORST memory, so go easy on me if I miss some important details. From what I've heard, she was always the nicest of the bunch, always caring for each of her siblings and even inherited a couple along the way that she still called her own; if you've never met Nana or Poppy, I am sure this is where she got it from. If you've been touched by her at any point in your life, I can almost, no actually, I CAN guarantee that it was out of pure love. Sometimes it seemed like she was angry or disappointed in your actions, and rightfully so, we're sinful people, but she was as close to heavenly and angelic as they come. I have never, ever come across somebody that disliked my Mom, in-fact, many adopted her as their second mother; you couldn't have met somebody with a bigger heart and everybody felt it. Now, I have heard stories from her and my aunts, that in high school, she was always picked on for being too nice, or back in those days (which was a Wednesday by the way;)), she went to a school that was predominantly African-American, during the 70’s, and Mom was about as white as they come, well minus the blonde hair; I never heard a story finishing with her hurting anybody, that's what her sisters were for ;)! She had the most lusciously chocolate brown hair with a hint of red wine swirling through it, her curls were always natural and it was always so shimmery and bright that it created her veritable halo over her head. 

As I write this out, I am struggling to think about how Mom and Dad met, and unless I've completely forgotten the story, I don't believe we were ever told this story; an incredibly lucky story on my Dad's behalf I am sure. From what I recall, they were high school sweethearts and then, as far as I know, BOOM, married. I'm sure there is a much more imaginative story floating out there somewhere, but it seems to have floated out of one of my ears and into the heavens; probably my right ear, because my left ear popped back in 2001 and the scarring probably closed up any exits, but we'll get back to that story in another post. 

Let’s skip forward to what many claim as the biggest mistake in any marriage, children; our parents had three devilish boys from 1983-1987, each two years+ behind the previous. Not surprisingly, the first born was the favorite, he always has been and always will be. Following the natural order of things, the middle child (me), was neglected and treated as old news and although Mom and Dad would never admit it and it seems planned from the dates above, I was probably an accident. Just wait until the youngest came along, he was the baby and reached almost as favorable stature as the eldest, leaving the middle clamoring for third position. My brothers, will of course, write those previous sentences out in quite different orders, but I wrote it first and it's on the internet, and you can't put anything on the internet that isn't true, right State Farm? In reality, my parents never favored any one of us over the next, in-fact, there were many, many occasions when our parents were unable to differentiate their children from other children; everybody was family, whether they liked it or not and the favorites has always been a running joke in our family. 

Are you ready for one of the longest paragraphs ever written? Here's where many of you illustrious readers probably have me beat, and would probably consider me to be a terrible son as well; I will forget to describe probably 100x more items then what I will actually bring out on paper, err on blog. From the time I was born until the time Mom passed, whoops, cats out of the bottle now, some of you may already know, or postured from previous posts, that Mom had been struggling with Breast Cancer for 6 years and had finally and reluctantly, crossed the metaphorical finish line; I tried to use a racing metaphor because she loved racing just as much as the next guy/girl at the track. Although it seems she impacted many peoples lives and crafted her three boys piece by piece, the events experienced during my general life experiences while my Mom was alive have become a giant blur, hence why I would qualify for a terrible son; there are always flashes of memories that come flying through my head from time to time. Her life in these past six or so years, have obviously been the most memorable, due to her great struggle that was handled with such tenacity and heart has touched so many peoples lives by being such a strong powerhouse during her battle with breast cancer. In-fact, I remember times when she would drop us off at school, good ole Jefferson Elementary, where our teachers had nearly bludgeon us cold to get us pried from Mom's legs. I have countless memories of coming home, very late of course, and finding Mom sitting on the porch awaiting my arrival; I'm sure there are many children of all ages that have encountered this with their Mothers, but I don't recall seeing it from any of my friend’s parents. I recently encountered a joke that I probably should have known for quite some time, which fits perfectly into the next memory. 

Mom was always trying to make us boys happy, if we wanted to go out, she made it happen, she always found some money somewhere and often handed us her debit card to go out with; don't go reading too deeply into this, we were by no means wealthy. 

In-fact, she would give us money with the instruction to bring her change, but she never seemed to get any back; we either spent the whole lot or our wallets got fatter while hers blew out spider webs and dust. Additionally, whenever she would hand us her debit card, it seemed she wouldn't get it back for days at a time; this didn't necessarily meant we were on a spending spree, but why give up the goods unless your hand is forced. The joke I previously mentioned isn’t as much of a joke and it is a play on the word Mom; Mom seems to, at least in most occasions, to stand for Made of Money, get it? 

I think on of the funniest memories I have of Mom, at least at this moment, happens while Dad is asleep; I can almost bet that some of the greatest memories of all time, for anybody, happen because somebody else fell asleep before everybody else does. We were currently painting the living room inside of the house, so all of the furniture was scrunched in other rooms. I don’t remember exactly how we ended up in this situation, but Dad was sleeping on the living room floor while all four of us were still away, big mistake! 

We got our hands on a camera somehow and were taking pictures of the night, after dad fell asleep, completely innocent and sober by the way, we corralled all of the empty cans and bottles of beer we could scrounge up, as well as cigarette boxes and really anybody who would pass out at the bar would have and cluttered them around him; picture time!!! 

As you could imagine, we were all giggles the whole time and when dad woke up shortly after it all, he was NOT happy; we still laughed the entire time. It could have been worse, we could have painted his toenails, which we also did onetime he fell asleep on the couch; both Mom’s ideaJ. There are so many flashed of memories that I could be writing down here, like huddling in the camper at lake Havasu during a monsoon and Mom and Dad rescuing the boat out of the lake after it crashed on a rock; Dad drove the boat around with the boat nearly submerged while Mom backed the truck and trailer down the slip, for the first time I believe. There were times that many people would be very spiteful, if not hateful at a person for something they’ve done, accident or not; Mom had another way of doing things, she was a forgiver, some of our best friends came from unthinkable acts and it wouldn’t have happened that way if it wasn’t for Mom. Mom had a big triumph in racing as well; it was the fun race for So-Cal Sprinters at Adams Kart Track, and it was the Mother’s race, I believe that’s what it was called. I was racing the event prior to hers and we had only one go-kart, I ran it up the hill and flipped it but she still hoped in it, after we checked it and cleaned it of course; she went on to win the event, and further more, passed people in places that track veterans never even conceived, those were good times. Even the simplest things, like typing the way and speed that I do now, is because of here inspiration and training; imagine how long it would be between posts if I didn’t type at approximately 90 WPM. I could write for days, and well technically I have, but it won’t take you that long to read it so it doesn’t count as writing for days now does it; unless you want me to write the worlds longest post and turn it into a novel…I didn't think so; on to the next paragraph, or we’ll be here all day, which wouldn’t be so bad when talking about my Mom.

There have been many occasions where I jokingly talk about things in my life and why I can’t do certain things because of them; this pertains mostly to chores and anything that requires getting out of bed, in most occasions. Now I know my Mom would give me a look that meant something about not using her passing as an excuse to not get on with life; we also joked from time to time about using the BC card to get what she wanted, she never did and we often got the same look for cracking the joke as well. Of course, with me being a good, traditional son, I would have to come back with a rebuttal that would probably have to explain to her how much of an influence she'd been on everything I have ever done; I've come to find that she had been one of the biggest influences on many more people outside, as well as inside the family. Some of you that knew her will pick-up on the fact that my writing has been heavily influenced by her, on top of the many other things that you will see come up through my writing. Now, lets not go writing off the multitude of people in my life that have influenced my life in some of the same ways; you all have helped to form me into the handsome, loving gentleman that I have become, this post isn’t about you guys now is it? However, considering all of the people that I have had the pleasure of meeting, and some of them I call my second mothers and fathers, I have never met a person so generous and caring as my mother; I have never seen her do anything out of spite and I have matured purely from the realization of how wonderful she really was. Now to explain the excuse that I mentioned waaaaaaay up the page; it’s about time right? 

Mom had passed on April 2nd 2013, not on April 1st, she was never a fan of April Fools, quite frankly I think she was too wise to be fooled during April fools, so we never caught her of guard; it was probably because she had three boys, she could never let her guard down. The couple of weeks leading up to this date were quite the emotional struggle, with all of the family coming in and out of the house to visit mom, as well as my continued struggle, had made it very hard to want to do anything but eat, sleep and repeat. For somebody like my Mom to be in the state of pain and quite completely out to lunch as she was, was heart wrenching for me, and I am sure for the rest of my family; you could hear a needle drop when it was quiet and those were probably the loudest times in the house, because that’s when you start to think about what you will be missing for many years to come. I am sure you can fathom, even if you had never gone through something like this, how it affected my motivations coming up to April 2^nd, and even after her death; it’s taken me this long to write anything about it and the previous sentence was probably the hardest of this entire post. However, a very good friend of our family, Mark Talmo, put it into words very well at her wake; "she didn't leave us, she wouldn't do that to us"; Love you Mom and you will always be remembered by so many. I know you have probably heard it a million times, but she has not died, she has merely moved onto the next life and is healed, without stress, pain or illness.

I can't likely comment on how she affected the lives of the many people that filled the church during her wake, and explaining every detail of how she has affected my life would simply require an entirely new blog. However, I can explain how much she has influenced me to push through my recent struggles with kidney failure, she always had a smile on her face and was willing to push through all of her pains and weaknesses to make everybody in her life as happy as can be; I can only claim that I am living up to part of her legend, as they are obviously very big shoes to fill, but every time I feel even slightly down and out, I think of her through-out her struggle, which she made seem like nearly no struggle at all, and that gives me that extra oomph.

I was going to continue to write about my other struggles since my last post, but I don't think it would be rightly so to put them together with a post about my minuscule debacle. I don't plan on making you wait nearly as long for the next post, but then again, I never did to begin with.

Not So Daily Updates - I Guess We're Getting Everything Out of the Way Now

I know, I know, I haven’t posted in quite some time, looks like almost two months; give me a break, I’ve got some pretty good reasons, not excuses. Let’s see, in the end of February there were some quite exciting things going on as well as some big downers as well; since I have terrible memory, and kidney failure magnifies the uselessness of my brain, I cheated a bit and went to Facebook to check out my updates. I’ll try to keep it in the same format I have been writing in all along, rather then creating bullet points of my posts; with all this gun controversy, is it cool that I said bullet points?

Since my last post was on the 23^rd, I decided that I should fill you in from there on out; don’t get jumpy now, I am still trying to wrench the memories from within my decrepit brain on my diagnosis and the gaps after discharge, I really wish I kept a journal. February 24^th was a Sunday, and if I remember correctly I had not been sleeping well/sick(ish) the days previous, so you know what, my thoughtful wife let me sleep in to catch up on my lack of normalcy; when I woke up, which was probably around 1 pm, I know lazy huh?, the house was nearly spic and span! Christa did a wonderful job of cleaning the house, and since I a such a heavy sleeper, she even vacuumed, in the room I was sleeping; you probably looked at your buddies and/or girlfriends while you were reading this and said, “who cares about their house cleaning?!?!?” and I have an answer. To be honest, I had been particularly lazy for about a week or so, and I surely did not deserve for Christa to go far and above like this, but she did, because that how big her heart is, and she knows the feeling you get when you wake up to a freshly cleaned house and wanted to do something really nice for her lazy, useless husband. The rest of that day went pretty much downhill, in a good way, all three of us vegged out and even got a free redbox movie code, don’t remember the movie though, sorry.

Here’s one of the mountains that we conquered, that shouldn't have even been an anthill if somebody just did their job. Monday, our day to get stuff done, most times we schedule my doc appointments on Mondays so we can both go together; I think Christa does this so that she gets the right story, since she knows I’m a terrible listener and getting feedback from me is like playing the telephone game, great game by the way! Okay, back to the story, after making numerous phone calls on previous days to get my Peritoneal catheter surgery schedules, and no reply was every made, we made progress. Now, I’m going to tell you what is most frustrating about this. When we went for the consultation, which seemed to be filled with negativity about the whole process and idea from the doc, she signed off on getting the catheter placed and told us to talk to the girls up front about scheduling the surgery; when we get up there, we were told that we will receive a phone call about when to schedule the appointment. I have never been keen on pressuring people to do their job, generally I, as do most people with even an ounce of common sense, expect that if their job is to coordinate or schedule the surgeries for the clinic, that they could at least do that; this was not the case. Since I dislike hassling people, and really making phone calls to begin with, I waited a week for that mysterious phone call, no dice; I made the dreadful call and the receptionist directed me to the scheduler, straight to voice-mail. I don’t remember the voice-mail word for word but it went something like this, “hi, this is blah blah, please leave your name, social security# and date of birth as well as the purpose of your call. If this voice-mail is received prior to 4p you should receive a call back on the same day.”; I left all the info and a brief massage about how I was waiting to hear from them on when my surgery will be, granted I left the VM at 4:11 pm, so I thought I’d get a call the next day, Nope. A couple days later, went through the same mumbo-jumbo and still received no call back, this call was made at approximately 1 pm, more then enough time. The very next day, both Christa and I called, left VMs and I actually transferred back up front to have  handwritten note left for the illustrious scheduler, still no call back for a couple days. I honestly don’t know what her other responsibilities are in the office, but with that many VMs left, you would think a return call could be made, none of the VMs were irate, so I don’t see why she would have been scared; its really hard for a place called General Surgery Associates to make money, if surgeries aren't being scheduled. Anyways, back on point, Monday rolls around and we go in with a vendetta, we asked to speak personally with whoever does the scheduling, and if they aren't available we’d like to see a manager. It wasn't but two minutes and the scheduler came out to get some additional info, then disappeared for what seemed like 30 minutes, then BAM, appointment scheduled for March 14^th! What a relief, although it should have never been that hard to begin with.

With the Peritoneal surgery finally being setup, this week was a very accomplished week, and we really didn't do anything. However, on February 28^th we received a phone call from the transplant team. The phone call was really just a notice to setup a consultation but what made it exciting is that the ball was finally rolling on the transplant, March 6^th was the appointment; I cant go into detail on this yet because that would leave me nothing to write about in the “future” parts of my blog. Even though we finally got the Peritoneal surgery setup and the Transplant consultation, the week was fairly tough; dialysis was a killer due to cramping and twitching. Now, you may ask, “why is cramping so bad”, well, most people get cramps from dehydration and this is the case for me as well. However, during dialysis I am supposed to have fluid pulled out of my body during treatment because my kidneys don’t do it as well as they should anymore; if I leave it alone, or don’t pull out enough I start looking like a pregnant woman, swollen ankles, face and hands, not fun. This is where the cramping comes into play, during these past few treatments, if any amount over . 5 Ml is being attempted to be pulled out, I cramp; imagine the worst leg cramp you've ever had and put that pain in your entire leg(s) and then basically strap yourself down to a chair for four years, um I mean hours, without the possibility of parole. Here’s another fun part, I twitch randomly and nobody has an explanation why. By “twitch”, I mean that I black out for a split second, and flail, or spasm; if you have ever had seizures, or seen somebody seizing, you could compare it to that. The real scary and tremendously scary part of it all is that I have no warning, it just happens and I have fallen in the middle of the parking lot before due to it. You may call me crazy, but I often find comfort in knowing 1Cor10:13, that God will never put me through anything that I cannot handle, and knowing is half the battle; some of you will get that reference.

It’s a bit late, but March is National Kidney Month; I posted it on FB on both my Blog page and my personal page, you should have at least “liked” my blog page by now.

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Have-a-Heart-Need-a-Kidney/333134736791971

Well, that should get you all the way up to March 4^thish, well subtracting the rest of the hospital stay, which I am still working on…slowly and the few weeks following; please be patient on those, as those will be completely from memory, and I had a terrible memory prior to all of this to begin with.

Event Update - LoweDown Hoedown - 02.17.2013

It took me some time to formulate how to express my thankfulness for the people God has put into my life and I will do my best to get the message across; if I forget anything and or anybody, I give you permission to knock me on the head.

As soon as the news came across that I had FSGS and Renal Failure, and that this would cause me to be out of work for quite some time, a very good friend of ours, Heather, scrambled into motion and put together a benefit event in my honor; we called it the “LoweDown Hoedown”. In just two weeks time she, with the help of our friends and family, were able to find McKee Ranch, get a jumper at a discount, reduced rate Face Painter, donated baked goods, contact a multitude of radio stations and news stations, do radio interviews, post on Craig list, face book, make posters and fliers, decorations, get two food trucks to come, Melteez and The Spot and all the while managing their everyday lives with their families. Now as far as I know, the event went off without a hitch, Heather and the rest of our friends and family really took care of everything; I wouldn’t know since most of my day was spent trying to tough it out through the joint pain and nausea that was lingering from a tough Saturday and I was barely managing to stand at points throughout the day. Everybody involved that was aforementioned as well as anybody that I have missed and/or didn’t know about was amazing to say the least.

We had put on a couple of garage sales, as you would know if you had been paying attention to my “Events” pages ;), and the weather was horrendous on those events the previous weeks; we were somewhat worried this would turn out somewhat similar. We were dead wrong, the weather was perfect; it had just broken into the 70’s, there was a slight breeze that was strong enough to keep you cool although never kicked up any dust. The Ranch was quite a little gem as well, tucked in between the 15 freeway and the Silverton Casino, it was so close enough to Vegas you would think it would have been a miserable place to visit, on the contrary, it was like you had driven miles out into the desert to go to a horse ranch and ride away your pains; it was quite a pleasant surprise. With the horses, goat, sheep, ponies, donkeys, chickens and everything else, it was a perfect little ranch that was packed with tons of fun!!

Max and Christine, the Owners and Operators of McKee Ranch were more then generous in the use of their personal property for our event; it was basically donated for our cause with minimal fees and near complete freedom to explore wherever we please. The food trucks, Melteez and The Spot both donated their time to come out and donated a portion of their proceeds as well; I couldn’t explain in words how great both of their foods were; you need to eat it yourself to understand. Channel 13 News put our event on the 13 things to do during the weekend segment and Fox 5 put it on their website as well. Also, Fox 5 Vegas even stopped by and did some interviews and played a 2 minute spot on the 10 o’clock news that night; although I missed it, it was way cool to know we were on TV. A few radio stations, 95.5, 97.5, 100.5, and 102.7 all put the event on their page and announced it during their morning show. 

  

We also had a raffle that went off pretty well with some pretty good items in it as well. There was a Family Four Pack to Sea World donated by 95.5, 102.7 donated a basket with a bunch of autographed cds, guitar picks and a Dierks Bentley Poster. Additionally, my wonderful sister in-law was able to get an hour golf lesson and greens fees for four at Rhodes Ranch Golf Club donated. Jacque from Indian Springs Towing donated her time, as well as a digital camera and a Razor Scooter. Our friend Jamie, who put on the garage sales for us, got a $30 salon gift certificate as well as 2 tickets to go see Divas @ the Rio donated; we won the Divas tickets, but with my energy levels, we gave them back so that somebody else could enjoy them. I saved the best one for last, you may not think so, but this is my blog and what I says goes, a gift certificate to Buffalo Wild Wings for 50 free wings; although I probably shouldn’t be eating them due to the sodium and whatever else might kill me, I love food and that hasn’t changed. 

I did my best to find links to a majority of the places that sponsored their time, resources and/or items, if i knew which businesses did so; please feel free to check out the links and show these people some love, I know I will whenever i can. 

Event Update - Benefit Garage Sale(s) - 02.09-10.2013

In my many years of experience, most people dread having to put together a garage sale, they only put it together when they are filled to the brim with stuff and need to make space for new stuff. Not Bill and Jamie, they volunteered to put on a garage sale with the proceeds going to benefit my family. They didn’t just put on a half-hearted attempt of a garage sale, they took on donations that filled their garage, had friends over to make baked goods and signs, posted on Craig list and face book and even went out picking up donations from people all around Las Vegas. These two, along with some good friends, really put on a good sale to help out our family; I couldn’t be more thankful to have them in our lives and owe them a huge deal.

Enough of the mushy, gushy thankfulness, lets get on with some of the details of the garage sale. The weather was actually quite terrible; I would say it was in the 50 degree weather, which wouldn’t be so bad, except there was 20+ MPH winds on both days and rarely any sun to be had, it was miserable. With the temperature, my 0% body fat and the fact that I wasn’t feeling well those days, it was really a struggle for me to sit around; I know, it sounds bad, but it’s true. Saturday was okay, for me I mean; I was able to stick it out the entire day, with two jackets on, curled up on one of the couches being sold. Sunday was quite the opposite, at best I was in rough shape, I spent almost the entire day sleeping; I felt bad for doing it while everyone else suffered.

All in all it went really well, even with the horrendous weather; we had made almost $700 from the garage sale(s) and still have more stuff to sell. We had/have televisions, lots of clothes, a weight bench, board games, game systems, movies, couches, chairs, power sports equipment, sports equipment, appliances; I don’t think I could list all of the stuff we had/have and with a majority of it being donated, they were priced so low some people paid extra to help out.

 

Some of the people that came out were really great, some even came out just because it was a benefit for me, I had people hugging, talking and praying for me that I didn’t even know; it was a really blessing. Bill and Jamie, Amy, Heather, Jamye, Ana and Christa have all been great; not only during the garage sale events, but during this whole debacle, I couldn’t express my gratitude enough for these people. 

My Diagnosis - And The Hits Just Keep On Coming...

02.06.2013  - And the Hits Just Keep on Coming

So I left you off with a little snippet of what my Mom has been through, and a teaser of some drama. So here it goes. It was the week of November 14th-18th, the biggest Karting race in North America, maybe even the Americas in general...SKUSA SuperNationals hosted at The Rio, here in Las Vegas. My Mom had been visiting for a week prior and would be leaving shortly afterwards; the rest of my side of the family was coming in just for the race as my brother would be competing. Some of you may understand, being that most of you are close racing friends, others may pickup on it due to other sports or hobbies that your family had been engulfed in, just how life just changes gears when something like this is going on. I took vacation time out of work and even packed a bag so I could stay at the hotel, even though I lived 15 minutes away from the track; I had racing on the brain and nothing else. Mom stayed at my house, with her newest favorite member of the family, Mason; what grandma in their right mind would want to stay away from such a wonderful child. She would drive down with my wife or her sister, my Aunt Mary, and hang out at the track almost daily; she still showed no signs of slowing.

Everything was hunky-dory, as she would say, until Sunday, or "Super Sunday!" as it was known at the track. My wife, who was sleeping upstairs in our bedroom, had received a call from my Mom downstairs in the guest room calling for help as she couldn't feel the right side of her body and couldn't get out of bed. Mom ended up at Valley Hospital and was being tested for strokes and brain tumors. All of this was happening without my or my younger brother knowing; she didn't want to clutter our concentration for the big race, like I said in my last post, she was always thinking of others. After the race was over, Dad, who knew all along, seemed rushed to get everything packed up and going; he wanted to get to the hospital and we didn't understand the rush. When the question arose as to why we HAD to go, he dropped the bomb on us; he didn't have too many details, besides her being there, so it actually didn't devastate us...yet. After arriving at the hospital and seeing Mom, it hurt; you never want to see anyone close to you in the hospital, especially your Mom...especially MY Mom. They were calling it a "mini-seizure" and that there was a tumor in her brain. The doctors here weren't very hopeful with her prognosis and were going to continue tests; my Mom just wanted to go home to City of Hope. During this entire episode, my Mom was still trying to make sure everybody was comfortable and apologizing for creating such a hassle; it was confusing to the nurses and doctors as to why she acted this way, but it was normal for us. To cut a long story short, she ended up being released, finally, and we were able to transport her back down to So-Cal. After being put on another treatment that was supposed to have a 10% chance of working, she was back to gardening, cleaning house, cooking, and even working for my Dad's electrical business; life went back to "normal" for her, she is a fighter.


Now lets scroll forward a month, to my debacle that I’ve dragged everybody into. I believe were back to the 18th of December, and not a creature was stirring; well actually a lot of creatures were, mostly nurses poking and prodding at me throughout the night; even the in-house insurance representative come by in the middle of this night to get my co-pay-yes, I know. You're probably asking what the point of my two stories about my Mom was, well, it will come more and more apparent as my story goes on; however, it begins to set it in today. This is the morning that I start to understand that I have a real issue going on; this is the morning that I meet Dr. Singh. He seemed like a very well mannered, smart and caring individual; I really liked him and it sucks in the future, because I accidentally got him through a paperwork mix-up. Although he had a solid character, and seemed to be very astute, he was also confused at the cause, and the severity of my condition. He couldn't figure out how a 27 year old, that appeared to be healthy on the outside, non-drug user, non-alcohol drinker could be burning through a liter of "bi-carb" every five hours and not show signs of any sort of recovery. He even re-asked me about my "street drug" usage, twice. He mentioned how my numbers were improved, but only marginally, and how I should be way ahead of the curve by now; I did a lot of nodding, considering the drugs I was on. Due to my sickness, well probably more-so my kidney issues, I was nauseous, severely achy, had cramps, the room was constantly spinning, my blood pressure (BP) was through the roof and my temperature was feverish. The upside is that I had Morphine, Percocet, or Prescription Strength Tylenol to help with the pain, and nausea meds for my stomach-I was set. Prior to leaving, Dr. Singh wanted to make sure I was informed as to where the testing might lead. None of the testing was invasive until he mentioned the Biopsy; that's when I took a lesson from my Mom and sucked it up and began to take this adventure real serious.  Although I was very out of it due to the aforementioned drugs, I was on the ball about keeping a big majority of my friends and family updated through text and Face book; I'm sure this was my way of distracting myself considering as I only had 2-1/2 channels to watch. Moments later, my breakfast shows up-French toast and eggs with some fruit on the side. Meals show up throughout the day, even if you request not to be fed. To my surprise, and I am sure everybody else's surprise that's reading this, the meal was actually good; I'd pay for it at a restaurant. Ok, let’s not get too crazy now. Even though I was looking forward to my hospital stay, at least three times a day, I had asked Christa to bring me something edible from the magical, mystical, outside world; In & Out was my request but that didn't happen until months later. Boy was it a good thing she brought me something because out of all the different choices of meals I could have throughout the day, french toast was the only one that the hospital couldn’t botch. 

It wouldn't be until around 7 pm that I would hear anything more from the doctors and this is when I met my General Physician. When she came in, she listened to my lungs and heart and squeezed my ankles, like every body else, and then gave me nearly the same spiel about my numbers not improving like they should be. I had gotten so used to hearing that my numbers were improving, just not like they should be; that the conversation almost literally played itself out before the doctor actually said the words; I was on hospital time now and there was nothing I could do about it.

All this time I had spent texting and FBing my ordeal to family and friends that wanted to hear updates; occasionally I received a phone call or text from friends that had heard about my ordeal and were concerned, I was really beginning to feel the love. However, now that I’m blogging about it you can read about it whenever you’d like, well really whenever I get around to finishing it up. This concludes today’s broadcast schedule, nevertheless there are other reads on the site and you can always check out the upcoming events page to see how you can help.

My DIagnosis - Admitting Your Kidneys Have Problems Is The First Step To Revcovery...Or So They Say

...Aaaaaaannnnnnnd we're back.

Where did I leave off? Oh yes, I had just received the news that I needed to be admitted into the hospital. I had already been sitting in the ER for quite some time now, I’d wager about four hours; remember that my phone was dead and I don’t know how to read one of those darn-fangled round things they hang on the wall. Soon there-after, something exciting happened; I got moved from a chair in the hallway, to a chair in the procedural room, which might as well have been in the hallway with the amount of foot traffic going through this room. To be honest, the room was way too-small, it was more of a closet that was turned into a patient IV center. In-fact, the cool thing about that is, I think they forgot that they stored pallets of saltine crackers in there and with my nausea I had hit the jackpot since saltines were the only thing I could really eat; keep that in mind because you never know how much you value something until you have kidney failure and everything changes. While I waited for a bed to come available on one of the floors, I sat in this room and snacked on saltines, took in 2 whole banana bags, gave 5 vials of blood, a urine test and a partridge in a pea…no wait, no partridges or pear trees. Apparently hospitals are busy places because I was here for another couple of hours, maybe you can help me out, but the little hand was near the 3 and the big hand was all the way at the top; not sure but I think it was 3 o’clock. By now, I had made the spousal phone call and informed her of my inevitable demise, or at least my admittance into the hospital; demise wasn't even playing in the back coffers of my brain yet. I also explained to her that I have no idea where I will be located when she gets off of work so there may be a slight scavenger hunt involved; she loves scavenger hunts, so she may just enjoy looking near and far for me. I had her go on one before I proposed to her but that’s really irrelevant to the story; although it may come up at a later date, but this show must go on.

Now I know, technically I’m not admitted in the hospital yet, I’m still in the ER and you were hoping to hear about my lavish room with all the quaint little amenities involved, well so was I, but I was stuck downstairs with armed guards walking around from the local prison; just as I thought the said guards were coming to take me in, I was moved again. No, not to a room upstairs but to a long hallway filled with little curtain rooms. This is where the real fun begins; during my short couple of hours in this room, I had given about another 25 vials of blood and six blood cultures; the blood cultures look like soy sauce bottles. I would venture to guess, based on some quick Google searching, that I had given about 2/3s a pint of blood for testing. For comparison, when you donate blood, you give a full pint and I don’t even think anybody wants my blood right now anyways; I have kidney problems remember, try not to forget again. Did I mention that they made me put on a dress? Yeah they did and it was cold, but I left my boxers on because I didn't want to be “that guy” walking down the hall. Don’t go telling anybody, but my wife had previously beaten some shrewdness into me since we got married; I use to change down well past my skivvies at the race track without cover prior to her.

Shortly after I had cured the shortage of blood in the local blood bank, I met with the ER Nephrologist (Kidney Doc) and he seems thoroughly perplexed as to why I was having the issues I was having. He seemed to be going through the standard initial questions and then paused a bit before asking the next one, “are you taking any ‘street drugs’?”. I gave him the answer that any responsible 27 year old father and husband should give, “nope, never have.”; he didn't seem to believe me and went on to explain that I will soon be moving to a room and that some additional tests will need to be taken. Alright, it seems fitting that if I did all the blood work, plus a urine test prior to seeing the doc, that I would have something to tease you with; well I don’t. I didn't ask for specific blood work numbers, because well, I wasn't on the ball with it yet. I did however ask him, and pretty much every nurse the even slightly peeked into my room about what they knew; no dice, the best answer I got was, “your room should be ready by now but you might have to wait a couple hours.” 

Shortly after my interrogation, I mean, consultation with the Neph., my lovely wife arrives. To my disappointment, Mason didn't come with her, he had just been dropped off with my sister in-law, Justine; she plays a good part in my entertainment value in the hospital in the future, which is pretty huge.
Okay, okay, back to the good stuff. Approximately 30-minutes later…A ROOM IS AVAILABLE!!!! If you didn't pick up on it, I was actually excited, not to be in the hospital with kidney problems, but to finally have a room and the rest of the world was already beginning to fade away and I didn't realize how far gone I would end up; neither did you, until you read that line, did you? 

On my way up I was trying to figure out what dis-configured  fully and completely deaf, bronchitis spewing, elderly roommate I was going to have, and then my transport started making small talk. This was a thorough relief, because it started with, “looks like you’re getting your own room, in the new building.” What a relief, because I was probably already going to have a hard enough time sleeping with everybody poking and prodding at me, much less dealing with a TV volume entirely too high and Captain Wheezy and Sneezy. After being dropped off by transport and getting settled into my single bed hospital suite equipped with private bath AND shower, enough room for another bed for guests; this actually happened later in my stay, I even had my own TV with 13 channels; 2 of which were Spanish, 2 were always covered in infomercials, 1 was the hospital info channel, and 1 was a live feed of the Las Vegas Courthouse; life was rough coming from 100’s of satellite channels with DVR. 

Lets scroll forward a bit; well only 30 minutes though. Dun, dun, dun…Christa’s parents arrive. I would have to say that at this moment in my kidney adventures, I began to really understand what the term “being Christ-like” actually meant; even though that previous paragraph doesn't sound like it, but that’s the point right? To give you and idea, my in-laws, Rick and Marie Jackson, live in Mesquite, Nevada, which is an hour outside of Las Vegas; they hopped in their car and drove down to come and see me in the hospital without question. Now you might think, what parents wouldn't do that? Well, technically they only adopted me into their lives, and it was probably against their wills since Christa was set on marrying me anyways; they will deny it but I know the truth. Oh, they know I’m kidding!!! At this point in the story we are all still hypothetically still in the dark about what is going on and for them to drive down merely because I was being admitted is still astonishing to me; that is one of the many reasons why they are so loved, by so many. More of their details will be revealed later, as they tend to stick around for quite some time during my little journey; this is quite significant because even they couldn't stand the hospital food. 

Now, I haven’t mentioned it because I assumed everybody reading this has had the flu and knows how it feels, and most of the time it felt like death, but I was just sick not dying…until now; apparently I was worse then sick and I was feeling it. Not to sound like I’m complaining, but I had a brand new cough that nobody could explain, my lower back was killing me, almost like my kidneys were trying to leave my body, and nausea would make me “do the Technicolor yawn” at the smell of anything thicker than air. According to the nurses on my floor that night, most kidney diseases don’t really show any symptoms until something sets it off. Well, the flu was trying to kill me and did something to really upset my kidneys, because I went from bad, to knocking at deaths door, overnight. One of the doctors that initially came in to introduce himself and do a quick exam, which always consisted of listening to my breathing and squeezing my ankles, we’ll get back to that, and was joking with Christa about putting Pine-Sol in my soup; I chuckled and then looked at my wife who had let the joke go completely over her head, which made me chuckle a little harder and boy did laughing hurt. After some more blood work, this will happen approximately every 2 hours, like clockwork, for my entire stay; I was taken downstairs to do an ultrasound of my kidneys. 

I was still in the, go-with-the-flow mode of thinking and really wasn't concerned with my condition or what may come of it; it would seem that nobody really knew what was wrong and I was just going to be flushed with more bags of sodium bi-carbonate until I was healthy again. Although, it seems that I couldn't care less about what is going on, it was actually quite the opposite, but I was able to keep my cool and handle it like a champ; all thanks to my Mom. My Mom, Susan; yes the same Susan I mentioned in my first post, has been battling breast cancer for well over five years now. She has had multiple surgeries, including a mastectomy, been through every type of chemo and radiation treatment that one of the leading cancer hospitals, City of Hope, has to offer and lost her hair on a few occasions. Nevertheless, she still walks with her head held high and a smile on her face, she has always done her best to cover her pain even though you can see its excruciating and, although obvious, she did really well at covering her weaknesses up. My Mom was always out to help everybody before getting cancer, and Stage-4 breast cancer wasn't going to stop her now. Make sure you take note, because this is really significant in my motivation to be as upbeat and forward thinking throughout my stay as I was; if she could go through everything she was going through and nary blink a I eye at it, what do I have to complain about?

Although you would normally look at that paragraph above and say that is a ton to go through, it’s not over. I saved a real doozie for you and it going to have to wait for my next post because I’m exhausted and life isn't so easy when you lose 32 lbs in the hospital after only weighing 142 when you were admitted. Don’t you get your panties, or boxers, or any sort of undergarment, if you’re wearing some, all in a bunch; I will still be doing my best to post and try to catch up to present time. 

My Diagnosis - Here, Hold My Kidneys, I Saw This In A Cartoon Once

Call me Ishm...I mean, David Lowe; I have been given many nicknames, but Ishmael is definitely not one of them and I definitely haven't ever traveled the seven seas searching for a giant whale, even a figurative one. I've never had a personal journal or diary, much less a blog, but let's take a whack at it and see how this turns out. I don't want to, and won't give a full auto-biography of my past right now, that's 27 years that may or may not be relevant to any part of this story and I don't fully feel like sharing. In reality, who wants to hear about how I died 6 times, or any other boring story like that?

If I had to pick a certain day where it all changed, I would pick December 17th, 2012. That was the first day that I was admitted into University Medical Center Las Vegas for Acute Kidney Failure...or so we thought. But let’s build a little bit of the story and back up a few days, back to the 13th of December; I didn't even realize it until now, probably due to my overall lack of superstition, but that would be "lucky" 13 wouldn't it? I would stake claim on this day as the beginning to a long and tiresome "adventure"; on this day, it seems, I contracted the flu. Most days I would be somewhat relieved to take a three day weekend, even though it starts out being sick; i was counting on the fact that I'd be sick for one day and be done with it. When Monday morning arrived, I was still very sick and I had spent the last four days and nights on, we'll call it the "throne" with, "the runs", and that is definitely an understatement. I had decided to tough it out one more day and return to work Tuesday, my wife, Christa, whom I have deemed to be the most amazing person alive, had other plans. She had decided that I was in no condition to even lay on the couch and watch House, M.D. any longer, which was throwing hints at me all weekend but we'll get back to that later. She ambushed me, on her way to work she called a friend, whom of which ends up being a lot closer to us than we had ever thought, to come and deliver me to the ER.

Although I despise the ER due to its long wait times and sense of frustration from seeming to never accomplish anything, I am thoroughly thankful that my wife played her trump card and forced me to go. I have been told by a few doctors and nurses that, if I didn't come in, I probably would have met my maker; which, when I think about it now, probably wouldn't have been so bad, but I'm not ready and apparently He has got bigger plans for me. Yes, there will be religious epiphanies and scripture through-out this blog but I'm no Preacher, so don't get bashful and run off. After spending the entire day in the ER being hydrated from severe dehydration, the ER doctor came back to discuss some blood work that had been taken earlier. Though he tried to soften the blow, he didn't have a good look on his face; it seemed that, at that time, I had Acute Kidney Failure and would need to be admitted to the hospital immediately.

I know, this is where I write about my inner feelings that resulted from the impact of this news, but to be honest, I didn't have any...I was empty. Not from a lack of emotion, if you ask my wife I am actually quite emotional. I chalk it up to the fact that I had been through worse and spent many nights in the ER for myself and/or my two brothers and never had to worry about something so life altering; even after dying 6 times or cutting my leg open with a SkilSaw. We had always pulled through without much more then a scar and a good story to talk about when friends and family were around; apparently this time was different. I put my best Susan Lowe face on and asked some ancillary questions about the diagnosis and if I could use the house phone, since besides my kidney issues, my cell phone battery had died and this was a major concern. Did i forget to mention, Susan is my Mom and other then being my Mother, she plays a big part in the days following this ER visit without even being in the same state; the picture should be a hint, closer details will have to come later.

Have you ever been so engrossed in a TV show or movie, and i hope my story has done the same, that you didn't even realize where the time had gone and then they do it to you,

...To Be Continued...

Well, I'd hate to file into that category, but it seems my initial post is dragging on and I'll continue it another day. So, without being too repetitive, even though I just shot myself in the foot by mentioning the repetition,

Don't get all discombobbulated about it, I have unwillingly inherited a considerable amount of free-time due to my rare and irreversible kidney issues and posting updates throughout the week will probably come easily. If you can't handle the suspense and want to get more details, visit the "About Us" page, but be warned...spoiler alert!!!