I never thought I would need a new kidney

So, how is Peritoneal dialysis going? Well, it’s better than no dialysis! If I were to choose to quit, they would put me on hospice care. But to answer the question, there are pros and cons. I’m lying here at 2:53 am, wide awake, due to “drain pain,” hence the heating pad on my belly. The catheter in my belly puts 2500 ml’s of fluid im my abdomen per cycle, lets it “dwell” for abut and hour and a half, and then it pumps it back out through a tube. This is often painful, and there are four cycles of fill, dwell, and drain. “Drain pain” feels very similar to menstrual cramps, but I don’t get to take ibuprofen. For draining, I also have to lie only in my right side, sit, or stand. Needless to say, I rarely get a good sleep. My dialysis machine (cycler) beeps an alarm any time some tube is not getting good flow. I have to check the lines to see what the problem is.
Another con is the calories! The fluid solution is a dextrose water, so your body does absorb the calories. One treatment, meaning every night, is calorie equivalent to one meal and one snack! Not fair! I already was being careful with my diet restrictions, and now I’m taking in calories that I don’t even get to willingly partake of!
Generally, I don’t really feel “good” until about an hour after treatment is over and I get up. A successful treatment takes 9 hours. It is not comfortable. Ideally, one should be sleeping through it.
It is still better than doing hemo (blood) dialysis at a dialysis center!

My dream for 2024 is to receive a new kidney! I got approved to be in the UNOS organ transplant waiting list in April if 2023. Started dialysis in June. It has been a long and hard road. Although peritoneal dialysis (abdominal) has been better for me than in- center hemodialysis (through the blood), it is still so hard to deal with every single night for the rest of my life, until I get a transplant. In the next few days, I will be posting information about being a living kidney donor.

- There is no cost to a kidney donor. The recipient insurance company pays for ALL expenses related to donation. There are several medical tests required, but those are all covered at no expense to a donor. A donor does need to have all their personal preventative, gender related, and age related screenings or exams done on their own, but those should be kept up to date anyway. More on what specific tests are required in a later post.
The donor pays ZERO for qualifying testing, surgery, recovery, or travel, if required.

Let me know if you have any specific questions I can answer for you. Coming up- what is required to become a kidney donor.