What a long strange trip its been.

So, I've been maintaining this blog for several years now and I guess its finally time to end the journey.

Last Saturday my phone kept ringing. Unusual for me but I kept peeking at the numbers... mostly from Massachusetts but none recognizable. I don't answer phone calls if I don't recognize the number. If its important they'll leave a message. No messages were left.

Meg commented, "are you expecting an important phone call?" Well, I'm waiting on a kidney. She said "oh, right."

Sunday morning I awoke to the sound of what I thought was a leaf blower. But as it got louder and louder I recognized it as a helicopter. I thought... The Coast Guard and ran out onto our back deck to see if they were circling an area of the river, which isn't uncommon here in the port. But it was instead a medical copter heading north towards Portsmouth.  Still dark, I looked up into the sky and found myself staring straight into the big dipper hovering above my deck. I went back in to start my normal routine of tea, toast and CNN. The news was annoying so I opted to watch a show on demand instead. About 15 minutes into my show, at approx 6:35 am, my phone rang. Another Massachusetts number. I silenced it and continued to watch the show. About two minutes later the phone let me know there was a message. Who would call at this hour and leave a message. I listened to the message immediately, it was a representative from MGH, explaining that they had a kidney for me and needed me to call back ASAP.

I called back and spoke with the woman for about 15 minutes. It was all good news. A non risk kidney from a person in their 30's. She asked when I could get in and I said by 10:00 am, she said "make it earlier if you can." I rallied the house and we got to MGH for 9:30. They ran some quick tests and decided I should dialyze for two hours first because my potassium was high (darn, why did I allow myself to eat those mashed potatoes last night).

I was on dialysis by 1:40 and into the OR prep room by 4:20. About thirty minutes later I was in the OR and three minutes later I was out and don't recall a thing until much later that night when they woke me up so I could wave to Meg and Annie as it was time for them to leave.

Back in my room I was struggling with the need to pee, but all my pee was coming through the catheter they had put in me. I guess it was flowing out slow enough so what was hanging behind was putting pressure on my bladder. Eventually they understood what I was saying and they started manually helping the fluid move along by shifting the hose to accommodate the flow. Relieved I finally fell asleep. Unfortunately I was awoken almost every hour for some kind of poke or prod.

Monday morning I awoke to some slight discomfort but as the day went on the discomfort had become pretty real and it took a while to get that settled down. After that Monday went mostly well.

On Tuesday morning Meg visited and I could tell I was irritable and she just wanted to leave and I didn't blame her. Later in the day my heart started to race. it took about 5 hours to settle that down, but once settled I fell into a deep sleep and they actually let me sleep for about three whole hours. Still feeling a level of pain they jacked me up on pain killers and that got me through the night into Wednesday morning.

Wednesday started off well but then my heart began racing again... about two more hours of that before they got it settled and I got another two to three hours of solid sleep.

All the while I was being texted by well wishers and folks on Facebook with their messages of getting well and congratulations. None of which I had the focus to reply to.

Since Wednesday afternoon I've actually felt mostly great with an awareness of my surgery, but no real excessive pain worthy of whining about. I began to settle in nicely and order some food and watch some TV and listen to some music and nap... it was almost a dreamy experience.

Based on all of our conversations I was led to believe that I should expect to go home on Friday, but Thursday morning they decided they would send me home Thursday instead.

So Meg and Annie came and got me. We got a few lessons on proper care and my medication list and we departed for the port. With a short pit-stop it was a much longer ride than normal and when we got home I felt like hell so I climbed immediately into bed, where about 25 minutes later I was back to normal... well... relative normal.

This morning while Annie was in school and Meg was too busy on her computer to notice... I secretly broke down crying. I'm not even sure what those tears were for. Perhaps the joy of this long strange trip finally coming to an end. Perhaps the sadness that another persons life was lost so I could try to get back to a more normal life. Perhaps its just the natural expression of being so overwhelmed about everything and just feeling a sense of relief. Idunno... no shame here for these tears. I've earned the right to cry for any reason after these past eight years and particularly the last four and a half that I've been on dialysis.

Thanks Laura Debesse Faherty for giving me the best blog name to track my story. And thanks to all whom have read these stories and encouraged me to continue. The trip isn't officially over yet. There a few battles ahead, but unless something significant comes up I'll end this now the way I always have

My name is Bil... and I have kidney disease... but I also just got a new kidney and the outlook is good.