The life of a dialysis patient – part 1
By Bob P. – guest blogger
A peek into the life of a dialysis patient
Nearly three years ago, on this day I had had a kidney transplant. I had to arrive on the decision the previous year that after fifteen years of torturous dialysis, it was time to start unraveling the world again and not dedicate a significant portion of your life every now and then stuck with those needles.
I decided on having a transplant and hopefully with a new kidney, I would get to live a few good years as near to a normal person’s life. Though not a cure, but a transplant is definitely a workaround and another form of treatment that most people go for.
At the age of 32, I started feeling a bit of uneasiness in my lower abdomen and so visited a doctor. I knew I had some kidney complications, but hadn’t really realized its potential seriousness.
I was so young then and my kid was just a year old. I wasn’t ready to hear that I was culminating some major health problems. In retrospect, I expected to receive some kind of medication and be free. But soon after experiencing the visible symptoms, it became quite apparent that I had to undergo treatment.
Over 15 years have passed since I first faced the complicacy and then my life quite runs on three treatments a week, 52 weeks a year which implies 2340 horrendous treatments till now.
Fifteen years ago, there was still lack of modern kidney machines, chronic dialysis was more of a medical experimentation and transplantation was but a one shot affair. For the initial 5 years of my treatment, I was on home dialysis but then I preferred a kidney center.
I wouldn’t usually recommend home dialysis, except for reasons that it gives you the freedom of treatment.
Keep on reading: part 2
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