Hello faithful readers. I’m sorry to say that I have been neglecting this blog lately. I’ve been a bad, bad blogger, as I haven’t posted any blogs in several weeks: only one post in December, and none so far in January.

I hope everyone had a nice holiday season and not too stressful. My wife and I stayed in Oregon this year to save some money, but we were able to communicate with our families through the magic of video chat. I love that we live in the future, and can talk (video) face-to-face with anyone in the world with devices that everyone carries around in their pockets: truly amazing.

Sometime in December, my blood pressure was getting a little high, despite some recent BP medication changes, so I did what any (and every) smart dialysis patient should do — I called my nurse.

As per my nurse’s recommendation, I did a manual green (2.5% dialysate solution) bag for four hours before I did my dialysis treatment that night.
It has been awhile since December 14th, so I don’t really remember the exact amount of my total drain, but the ultrafiltration (UF) was somewhere around 1700 or 1800ml, meaning I took off almost 2 liters of extra fluid. No wonder my BP was high!

I think I had been fighting the notion that fluid retention was the reason for my high BP, as I do not want to think that my kidneys are getting worse, but it is a fact that anyone with ESRD has to face. My kidneys are not going to get better, but at least I have a treatment that gives me a measure of control over my life, and it is helping me to live a (somewhat) normal life.

Earlier this week I was contacted by the Legacy Hospital Kidney Transplant department. They do not have a kidney for me yet, but a part of being on the transplant list is that I need to meet with them at least once a year for a check-in and some testing. I am scheduled to do all this in a couple weeks, so I will check back in and let you all know how it went.