I got a call from the Urologist last night.
Things are better then I had thought. Having just gone through several trips to the emergency room, a hospital stay and a week of pissing gravel, I came out this end of the journey better than I went in.
Mt creatinine is way back down. I guess it helps when BOTH kidneys are working properly.
About a year ago My doctor at the time became concerned that my creatinine was creeping steadily upward, so he sent me to the Nephrologist (kidney doctor) and after an extensive series of tests he determined that I was going into stage four kidney disease.
About that time I retired, then I had to find an interim doc. We sold the house and moved to Sequim.
It has taken some time to get established with a new doc here, and it all came to a head when I had a large stone lodge in my left kidney. It was completely blocking off the drain for my left kidney.
Doctor Benson did a CAT scan and found the stone, brought me back in to pulverize the stone and is now doing follow-up. A blood draw and test was done last Friday, and the results came in yesterday.
The results were great. My creatinine levels were WAY down. They whole stage four kidney disease diagnosis was wrong. Yes I have kidney disease as a result of my diabetes, but not severe. The upshot is that I am a long ways from dialysis or kidney transplant. When my ceatinine was up over four, I was looking at eventual kidney failure. Now that is a remote possibility rather than an inevitability.
So all the anxiety and worry I have gone through about kidney failure were caused by a misdiagnosis. I was not undergoing kidney deterioration, I had a stone the size of a grape.
I am now undergoing some tests to determine why I am forming stones. Believe me, whatever the doctor recommends to avoide another megastone, I will do it.
Yesterday was 24 hour piss test. Pee in a jug for 24 hours. Mrs A has a bit of a problem with having a jug-o-pee in the fridge. She has trouble accepting the fact that urine is sterile, so it won't hurt you. Not that I am recommending keeping a jug-o-pee in the fridge, but it is not all that ookey.
I have to drop off the jug-o-pee at the lab this morning. Feels a little strange walking around with a jug-o-pee.
Tuesday, October 27, 2015
Friday, October 16, 2015
Pissin' Gravel
Literally. Or the closely related topic, Pissin' blood.
Right now I am doing both.
A week ago I all of the sudden developed severe back pains on my lower left side. As A person who has passed multiple kidney stones, I was pretty sure I knew what was going on. Except this was worse and didn't move at all.
So I went in to the walk-in clinic in Sequim. Their diagnosis was kidney infection, they gave me some antibiotics and sent me home. By Saturday, I was in no better shape, so I went back to the clinic, and they referred me to the Hospital in Sequim. After giving me some anti-nausea and pain medication they sent me to radiology for a CAT scan.
I had a stone the size of a grape that was completely blocking my left kidney. They did an operation to install a stent and kept me overnight for observation.
It was not a good night. There were a couple of psychotic patients, one on either side of me. The one lady was mean as a snake, attacking everyone who came near her verbally and some times physically. The other was an older gentleman in with pneumonia, He had no idea where he was or what was going on. But he yelled pretty much all night.
I asked the doctor if I was missing something.. Did they check my into the Psych ward for a reason? She laughed and said no, that this was the normal ward, they just happened to have a couple of disturbed people in at the moment. The one had been a patient for four months. The problem is that new laws forbid them from releasing the patient until they have some place to put them. Because the Federal Government has defunded the treatment of mentally ill people, no one takes them. Since this particular patient had a history of violence towards staff, no one would take her.
On a different tack on the same subject, take a look at his from a detached perspective. I have no skin in this game, just am making an observation. First the Reagan Administration defunds treatment of the mentally ill, dumping thousands of disturbed people out into the general population. Then gun violence and mass killing by mentally ill people rise sharply. Could it be that these things are interrelated? So if you want to trace the origins of the wave of mass killings, you can thank the Republicans. Better to blame them than blame the guns, which is a cop-out, We always had guns around, and you know what? Not a single one of them jumped down off of the rack and killed someone.This country desperately needs a system for dealing with the mentally ill. The problem with this is that if we effectively screen and treat the mentally ill, where are we going to get our politicians?
At any rate, after holding me overnight they sent me home, with an appointment to come back on Wednesday when the stone breaking machine was in town. Pretty neat. They bombard the stone with high frequency sound waves and it shatters the stone into little bitty pieces. Then over the next week or so, you piss out the pulverized stone pieces. You also piss blood, because pulverizing the stone is a lot like taking multiple kidney punches.
I have not been able to do much of anything for the past week, so I am going stir crazy. I have work to do but am supposed to take it easy until the Doc gives me permission.
I hope that today I can get out and repair the chipper.
Right now I am doing both.
A week ago I all of the sudden developed severe back pains on my lower left side. As A person who has passed multiple kidney stones, I was pretty sure I knew what was going on. Except this was worse and didn't move at all.
So I went in to the walk-in clinic in Sequim. Their diagnosis was kidney infection, they gave me some antibiotics and sent me home. By Saturday, I was in no better shape, so I went back to the clinic, and they referred me to the Hospital in Sequim. After giving me some anti-nausea and pain medication they sent me to radiology for a CAT scan.
I had a stone the size of a grape that was completely blocking my left kidney. They did an operation to install a stent and kept me overnight for observation.
It was not a good night. There were a couple of psychotic patients, one on either side of me. The one lady was mean as a snake, attacking everyone who came near her verbally and some times physically. The other was an older gentleman in with pneumonia, He had no idea where he was or what was going on. But he yelled pretty much all night.
I asked the doctor if I was missing something.. Did they check my into the Psych ward for a reason? She laughed and said no, that this was the normal ward, they just happened to have a couple of disturbed people in at the moment. The one had been a patient for four months. The problem is that new laws forbid them from releasing the patient until they have some place to put them. Because the Federal Government has defunded the treatment of mentally ill people, no one takes them. Since this particular patient had a history of violence towards staff, no one would take her.
On a different tack on the same subject, take a look at his from a detached perspective. I have no skin in this game, just am making an observation. First the Reagan Administration defunds treatment of the mentally ill, dumping thousands of disturbed people out into the general population. Then gun violence and mass killing by mentally ill people rise sharply. Could it be that these things are interrelated? So if you want to trace the origins of the wave of mass killings, you can thank the Republicans. Better to blame them than blame the guns, which is a cop-out, We always had guns around, and you know what? Not a single one of them jumped down off of the rack and killed someone.This country desperately needs a system for dealing with the mentally ill. The problem with this is that if we effectively screen and treat the mentally ill, where are we going to get our politicians?
At any rate, after holding me overnight they sent me home, with an appointment to come back on Wednesday when the stone breaking machine was in town. Pretty neat. They bombard the stone with high frequency sound waves and it shatters the stone into little bitty pieces. Then over the next week or so, you piss out the pulverized stone pieces. You also piss blood, because pulverizing the stone is a lot like taking multiple kidney punches.
I have not been able to do much of anything for the past week, so I am going stir crazy. I have work to do but am supposed to take it easy until the Doc gives me permission.
I hope that today I can get out and repair the chipper.
Friday, October 02, 2015
On Track
I have sadly neglected this blog for some time now. I closed my eyes for a second, and suddenly it is October.
I have been busy working around the place. There is a lot that can be done, but it is a little overwhelming even thinking of trying to bring order to 3 1/2 acres of woods. A lot of it is brush, blowdowns, broken off limbs, and pretty much unusable as it is. Clearing out the limbs and blowdowns will take a long time. For now I am clearing trails so I can navigate through the underbrush without fighting.
Eventually I see a network of trails between small meadows amongst the trees. There are a lot of very nice mature Cedar trees interspersed with Fir, Alder and an occasional Maple. I want to clear a number of small clearings and plant them with wildflowers. They have a product called "Meadow in a Can" which is a mixture of wildflower seeds. Once you clear the ground, you just sprinkle the seeds and voila' you have 20 different kinds of wildflowers. I used it on a small scale before, but can't wait to see how it does semi-wild.
There is a lot of beauty bark on the yard near the house. Looks nice and inhibits the growth of weeds. The trees I was cutting and splitting for firewood were downed Fir of pretty good size. Had a lot of thick bark. Since the had been laying on the ground for some time, the bark came off pretty easy in the process of splitting it for firewood. I set it aside.
I decided to bite the bullet and get a chipper/shredder. I purchased a Brushmaster commercial grade model, which will handle anything up to 3". Bigger than that it is firewood, smaller it is beauty bark.
I managed to break it after one week. The pulley on the flywheel split in two. I have been waiting for the replacement for three weeks. In the meantime I have been taking the hatchet and cutting the bark into three inch wide strips so I can feed it into the chipper.
One of the reasons I bought the chipper is because they don't allow much in the way of outdoor burning. There has been a burn ban on since we moved in here and the local dump does not accept yard waste. With so much debris in the woods, the logical thing is to turn it into beauty bark.
My cousin, Ginger, her husband Pat, my cousin Rick and his wife Robyn came up from Oregon for a much too short visit. Wouldn't you know it, the day they were supposed to show up, the water failed. We are on a well, and we just suddenly had no water. We had to call the plumbing service. We chose Brother's Plumbing because they had surveyed the well when we bought the place. At first they thought it was burned out points on the float of the holding tank. but when they replaced them, still no go.
They had to pull the pump, which was at the end of 170 feet of galvanized pipe. That meant the boom truck, and a helper. It was interesting watching them pull the pipe sections and get to the pump. Of course the pump was shot. The bill was just under two grand. Oh well the pump was 20 years old, and now we should be good for another 20 years.
We warned the relatives that we were in the middle of a well crisis, but they came anyway. By the time they got here the plumbers were almost through, But when they got through, what was coming out of the taps was not fit for human consumption. The water in the toilets was of course, grody, so Ginger had to take a picture and post it on the internet.
The water still has a slight chemical taste, but not too bad. My well water is still better than city water.
The weather has been spectacular. The days have been sunny with the temperatures approaching 70, cooling off at night to the high 40s, low 50s. I have been setting the fire before I go to bed, so all Carol has to do in the norning is drop a match and add a log once it gets going. Electricity is expensive and wood is free.
The fall mushroons have sterted showing up. Lisa found a Shaggy Mane on the edge of the lawn, I found a bunch of Boletus Edulis in the yard, which I dries, and when we were on a hike the other day we came across a bunch of Agaricus Arvensis. Good stuff.
Now that i have in the winter wood, and the weather is cooling off, I will havemore "inside time" so I will try to be more regular about posting on this blog.
I have been busy working around the place. There is a lot that can be done, but it is a little overwhelming even thinking of trying to bring order to 3 1/2 acres of woods. A lot of it is brush, blowdowns, broken off limbs, and pretty much unusable as it is. Clearing out the limbs and blowdowns will take a long time. For now I am clearing trails so I can navigate through the underbrush without fighting.
Eventually I see a network of trails between small meadows amongst the trees. There are a lot of very nice mature Cedar trees interspersed with Fir, Alder and an occasional Maple. I want to clear a number of small clearings and plant them with wildflowers. They have a product called "Meadow in a Can" which is a mixture of wildflower seeds. Once you clear the ground, you just sprinkle the seeds and voila' you have 20 different kinds of wildflowers. I used it on a small scale before, but can't wait to see how it does semi-wild.
There is a lot of beauty bark on the yard near the house. Looks nice and inhibits the growth of weeds. The trees I was cutting and splitting for firewood were downed Fir of pretty good size. Had a lot of thick bark. Since the had been laying on the ground for some time, the bark came off pretty easy in the process of splitting it for firewood. I set it aside.
I decided to bite the bullet and get a chipper/shredder. I purchased a Brushmaster commercial grade model, which will handle anything up to 3". Bigger than that it is firewood, smaller it is beauty bark.
I managed to break it after one week. The pulley on the flywheel split in two. I have been waiting for the replacement for three weeks. In the meantime I have been taking the hatchet and cutting the bark into three inch wide strips so I can feed it into the chipper.
One of the reasons I bought the chipper is because they don't allow much in the way of outdoor burning. There has been a burn ban on since we moved in here and the local dump does not accept yard waste. With so much debris in the woods, the logical thing is to turn it into beauty bark.
My cousin, Ginger, her husband Pat, my cousin Rick and his wife Robyn came up from Oregon for a much too short visit. Wouldn't you know it, the day they were supposed to show up, the water failed. We are on a well, and we just suddenly had no water. We had to call the plumbing service. We chose Brother's Plumbing because they had surveyed the well when we bought the place. At first they thought it was burned out points on the float of the holding tank. but when they replaced them, still no go.
They had to pull the pump, which was at the end of 170 feet of galvanized pipe. That meant the boom truck, and a helper. It was interesting watching them pull the pipe sections and get to the pump. Of course the pump was shot. The bill was just under two grand. Oh well the pump was 20 years old, and now we should be good for another 20 years.
We warned the relatives that we were in the middle of a well crisis, but they came anyway. By the time they got here the plumbers were almost through, But when they got through, what was coming out of the taps was not fit for human consumption. The water in the toilets was of course, grody, so Ginger had to take a picture and post it on the internet.
The water still has a slight chemical taste, but not too bad. My well water is still better than city water.
The weather has been spectacular. The days have been sunny with the temperatures approaching 70, cooling off at night to the high 40s, low 50s. I have been setting the fire before I go to bed, so all Carol has to do in the norning is drop a match and add a log once it gets going. Electricity is expensive and wood is free.
The fall mushroons have sterted showing up. Lisa found a Shaggy Mane on the edge of the lawn, I found a bunch of Boletus Edulis in the yard, which I dries, and when we were on a hike the other day we came across a bunch of Agaricus Arvensis. Good stuff.
Now that i have in the winter wood, and the weather is cooling off, I will havemore "inside time" so I will try to be more regular about posting on this blog.
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