Back to the Transplant Floor and Finally Leaving the Hospital (Kidney Failure)

Back to the Transplant Floor and Finally Leaving the Hospital (Kidney Failure)

 

    After 3 weeks in the ICU, getting back to the 7th floor felt amazing. Friendly, familiar faces surrounded me once again. I had gotten to know much of the staff as I had been in and out of the hospital a lot in the last 5 years. They all asked me how I was doing and took excellent care of me. I felt safe and at home. My sister stayed with me the next day and it must have been one of the hottest days of the year. I had a large window that was essentially almost the whole width and length of the wall. It had no curtain. The setting sun blazed and the air conditioning in the hospital was non-existent. I remember putting ice cubes all over my body to try to stay cool. One of the technicians there who knew me well, brought a second dinner into my room for my sister. I felt so happy and grateful to be so well cared for.

    Dialysis would now be on the 4th floor, no longer conveniently in my own room. I never knew when transport was coming to take me for treatment. It could be before breakfast, during lunch, or right before dinner. It made it hard to plan for visitors. Even worse, was I would get diarrhea. I have no idea why this was happening. I couldn’t just unhook from dialysis. My blood was in the machine and tubing. I would have to ask for a bedpan on many occasions while I was getting treatment. It was hard and awkward to use. It was also embarrassing as I was in a big room filled with patients. A curtain that pulled around my bed, provided only a modest veil of privacy.

    My psychosis had almost immediately gotten better when I moved to the 7th floor. I was still experiencing some residual symptoms. When I went to dialysis one day, I could hear another patient's machine saying, “I am the Devil, ha, ha, ha.” I wasn’t too frightened by this as it was a very cartoonish, bad guy voice.

    I was finally released 1 week after getting on the transplant floor; a five week stay. Soon after getting out, I would take a nap on my bed. I awoke because I felt like my body was suddenly moving or being touched while I was sleeping and I thought it was the psychosis taking on a new, physical manifestation. I would find out a short time later that there had been a small but noticeable earthquake. This was a big sigh of relief. The psychosis did subside completely after going home.

(I kept sitting on my glasses in all the delirium and I had to keep re-taping the arms back on)

 

(My double lumen port and dialysis catheter)

 

(Bruises from Heparin shots which are required when staying in the hospital to prevent blood clots)

 

 

(Feeling better and you can see I have lost my fluid weight)

(My niece and Nephew came to visit me)