I am sitting here on my machine right now. I wasn't motivated for the last few weeks. I don't know why. Nothing I could do but get motivated. Dialysis ain't going nowhere. This is my life. I don't see any change in the near or far future. I don't want to get on the transplant list. I am quite comfortable just doing Nxstage efor right now. I was thinking about it, but if I change my mind, I can get on later, but for right now, this is my life.

But I guess that don't mean that I have to be exicited or motivated all the time. I guess that ain't realistic. I guess I shouldn't be up on myself about that anymore. Nobody is pumped up motivated all the time about any one thing. I just have to do the best I can do when I can. If I feel up then, go with it. But when I'm down, I have to work through it. Just like I've been doing all my life.

When I think about it too much, I get in trouble. I think that's it's a long process, but in reality, it's nothing. The longest part is the se t up of the supplies and there's no getting around that. It has to be done. Drawing up the epo and the heparin, pulling the scabs, snappin and tapping. It's all part of the game.

I didn't want to get on the machine again today. I don't know what it is about Monday's all of a sudden. But I did get on though. It wasn't hard once i started working on it. It's just getting my head together to go ahead and get it done.

I guess I was just enjoying laying around in my bed. Sometimes I just don't want to think about it. Sometimes I just don't want to get started.

I know that it is to save my life. I know that it gives me a better quality of life. I know that I do it so that I can stay here with my kids a little longer.

Deep down inside it does not really bother me too much. Once I'm on it, I;m on it. Nothing to it. It doesn't even take me as long to get on as it used to. So, now what is the problem?


I think I think about it too much all of a sudden. I didn't used to think about it. I would just come in and get on it. But once I started thinkin g about it, things started to change.

I guess another thing could be that I don't have a schedule down yet for this school year. I am so used to having to take D to school and then come home and get on the machine that I this is very foreign to me. I guess another things is that SINCE I have more time, I am ABLE to do it a little different. It's not bad that I can actually go home and g0 to sleep for an hour or two before I get on the machine and still have time to get a treatment in and be off the machine before anybody comes home.

Went to the meeting on Friday 8/29/08. I met Annabelle. she was great. I liked her from our conversation on the phone the day before. She was easy to talk to. I talked a lot. I made sure I mentioned that I wasn't normally that talkative. I have already received two advantages already. 1-I can now email my daily reports to her. 2-she orders longer tubing especially for one of her patients and she gave me a few to see if I like them. I do because it keeps me from having to pull the tubing so far to be comfortable. 3-she orders the needles witht he picks on them. Although Ilike the ones with the picks Ilike the length of the others more.

Dialysis is going good this week. I have just been getting on the machine and going straight to sleep. Getting my blood all cleaned out while I sleep. Whodathunk it? I still really need a heating blanket, but it hasn't been that bad. I got some money for Valentine's day, I wanted to use it for a blanket, but I really do think they will go down in price once the weather turns warm. I am trying my best to make it until then.

When I started dialysis I knew that it would challenge me. I knew that time would be an issue. I wasn't a good time manager before dialysis and it wasn't going to change any time soon. Now that I am doing dialysis at home, time is really an issue. But I knew that. I knew that it would be. So, now ain't the time to start crying about not having time.

Honestly dialysis is not what is bothering me. Dialysis is the only way that I can continue to live period. Nothing more nothing less. It's just the only way for me to stay alive. I can think about it all I want to. I can go over it a thousand times and say it a thousand ways, but the fact of the matter is that I have to do dialysis in order to stay here with my family.

I chose to dialysis at home. That was my choice. I chose it because I hated being in center. I can't conveniently forget that little tidbit. I like being in control of my dialysis. I like being in control of the times that I do dialysis. \I like that sdd affords me better health and more energy than regular dialysis. It also affords me to be able to go to work.

I CAN'T be mad with dialysis.

11-26-07 lab

My phos level for 11/26 was 6.3 which is up from 5.2 last month. Prat suggested that I take Renagel, but I am not worried about it because that was a couple of days after Thanksgiving andn i was still eating sweet potatoes, broc and cheese, cornbread, ham ... And God only knows what else. We had nachos that week. Another thing about that day, was I had not dialyzed since Saturday. Quiet as it is kept, Friday was a short session because I had an alarm and it WAS black Friday. I thought I was going to go shopping. I also did that tx late (around 11:30pm). On Friday I didn't even do a tx (I didn't have enough small bags of saline). and Saturday I did the tx off schedulealso. I ate like a dog for about a week after Thanksgiving too.


One thing that I have learned though is that I still have to remember that I am should be careful about what I eat because I dont' want too much junk floating around in my blood. But that's about all that I am getting out of that.

I also need to be aware that it is very important that I find ways (which I am working on now), to make getting on the machine easier and not take as long.

AS of this am I called Nxstage to make sure it is ok that for me to prime the machine the night before. They said that I have 24 hrs to prime before I have to use the cartridge. If I can go ahead and set up the night before that will be less time that I will have to spend on the machine the next day. We'll see. But, today I am getting off the machine at 11:30 even though I didn't get on until 920. I got on at 920 because I didn't get home until after 830.
Normally, I am not getting off until 1 or so. So, 1130 is good. I havn't been off at that time since, dare I say in center.

There's two times to do this.....