Kidney's and Losing Weight

The Doctor's get concerned when a kidney patient loses weight.  So this morning Ken had to tighten up the notch on his belt to the next hole and weighed himself and he has lost 11 lbs and we know that they will be concerned about that on our next visit in September.  We have between now and then to get him to gain weight (I know ladies what a shame), but for him it is.  The issue is he has been more nauseous then usual (probably the medication).  We need to keep his levels stable for the transplant team to be happy with him, and that includes his weight.  Between him being nauseous, eating for kidney health that is going to be a difficult job.  He can also work out on the bowflex to build muscle (which increasing weight gain), but that also requires energy which he is lacking, especially after working each day. 

As of now there has been no movement on the kidney transplant and each passing day his kidney's don't get better, they get worse.  Maybe today we will put a call in to downtown to see what is happening on the file as it seems they need a little push.

Here's hoping to weight gain for him (not me), and movement downtown.

Give The Gift of Life Walk 2012

http://kidney.akaraisin.com/brampton12/cc4cad94184b4ca8981ecdfeeaa66b2a

We`ll be walking in the `Give the Gift of Life Walk 2012`again this year.  If you would like to sponsor me and my team to raise funds for a cause close to your `Kidney`please click the link above and it will bring you to the page where you can sponsor.

We thank each and everyone out there for your encouraging words, thoughts, and sponsorship throughout our fight with kidney disease.

Moment for your Kidney Thought

We are going through a roller coaster of emotions right now. 

We have a willing kidney donor which is really heaven sent we're sure! What angel would grant us with that one wish in life?  The moment where thought comes in, is how unselfish this person is.  Caring for another person as much as they do.  It amazes us!  Not that either of us are surprised by that gesture, and believe us if the shoe were on the other foot and this siutation presented itself, we too would be of mind to be a donor. 

In fact our daughter, who is to young to donate, but would have in a heartbeat (after all it is her Daddy), but a lesson has been taught to her through the kidney education classes as well as knowing that someone has come forward to create a better life for her Daddy and one day when of age she will be able to pay it forward if possible.

The moment of stress, is to know it's all out of our control.  All the Dr's appointments, tests, & meetings in the world for us we can organize, be on top of. However for a donor we cannot be involved, why you ask? We can not apply pressure to  the donor, which is totally understandable.  The one things that is frustrating is that the hospital team doesn't go about it all the right way.  No education to the donor to let the donor know that they have to be the one to contact the hospital to arrange the next steps (appointments, tests, etc).  The transplant team wants to know that the donor is really in it and truly wants to donate.  Who tells the donor this? In all the phamplets we have read it doesn't say that the donor does all the contacting to the transplant team, but somewhere between mind reading and talking to our own Kidney Specialist this is where the lessons have been learnt for us.

We are writing about the stress of it all, and hoping to help educate others in this situation, because knowledge is everything!

Praying for all those out there with similar situations as ours and hoping that this blog assists others in their endeavor with kidney diasease or organ transplant in general.

Keeping the Faith!