Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!

[thegrammalady]

i am thankful for 4 children, grown, on their own and doing well.
i am especially thankful for april, because without her i'd be living under a bridge)
i am thankful for 4 adorable grandsons (i want to buy PINK) (hint, hint)
i am thankful for my parents who are in excellent health in their 80's and still a big part of my life (january, oregon here i come again!)
i am thankful for ihd and everyone here, you all mean so much to me. i'm not sure i would want to do this dialysis stuff without you.

happy thanksgiving one and all
gobble, gobble

[Joe Paul]

Happy Thanksgiving everyone 

[idahospud]

I'm thankfoll  for being forchant to dot be on dialysis yet and to all of you her at IHD . The support is grate  and my family a husband that truly exec's me in sicknus and in health . a doter that continues to grow into a buttefol loving friend to her mom . The chains to babel to do the job the so love to help the mental ill . my all you her at IHD have a wonderful Thanksgiving  Love Carol

[Bill Peckham]

I am thankful for NxStage and the freedom it provides

I was driving, listening to the radio when the conversation touched on (at the 19 minute mark) freedom and the writings of Howard Thurman. I've been thinking about freedom lately. Freedom in the context of dialysis, in the context of home dialysis. Does home dialysis provide freedom? And how so? I think it does, but not in the way it is usually presented.

Often it is the flexibility of managing your own schedule that is said to provide freedom. The freedom to have the room warm and the TV loud while you dialyze. The freedom to set your rules in place of the dialysis unit's rules. Those are not profound freedoms. Thurman spoke of profound freedoms.

The freedom of innocence, the freedom of resignation and the freedom of struggle. Driving along, listening to the radio, I realized these three freedoms sum up my kidney experience. Initially, with working kidneys you have the freedom of innocence. You don't know what you have, you take your kidneys for granted and go about your life. This freedom is illusory, but people, indeed most people, can live long lives enjoying this freedom.

This is the freedom that people with sever kidney disease, with CKD5 miss. When you tell someone on incenter dialysis that you'll get your freedom back with a high dose of dialysis provided at home this is what they hope you mean (someone with a transplant can cover freedom from the transplantor point of view). It is imagined that at home things will be as they were, that they will get back to a freedom of innocence. A high dose dialysis provided at home is a great form of renal replacement but it is still a treatment, it will not let you reclaim your renal innocence.

On dialysis it is the freedom of resignation that is most commonly experienced. Making the best of a bad situation. Thurman quotes a spiritual, "I've been down so long that being down don't bother me." It's acceptance. The acceptance of nausea. The acceptance of low energy; of fuzzy, uremic thinking. There is a freedom in this, indeed I called myself a dialysis success story because I had accepted being on incenter dialysis. I felt liberated by this resignation, free to travel but also free to be self absorbed, free to be disengaged.

Incenter dialysis only took me so far, acceptance could only take me so far. Incenter dialysis left chronic kidney disease draped around me like a wet blanket, smothering dreams and ambition. For a while I sang being down don't bother me because I didn't know I didn't know I wasn't getting enough CKD5 medicine. I didn't know I wasn't getting enough dialysis. I didn't know things could be different. Because I didn't know, I didn't seek out change.

By chance I started dialyzing at home more frequently in September 2001, I started getting a higher dose of dialysis. Since January of this year I have been using the NxStage System One to dialyze over night, sleeping through a process that use to fill my evenings. It is now that I say NxStage has given me my freedom. On this day I give thanks for this freedom.

It is not the freedom of innocence: I'm kept alive by a machine, my innocence is gone. It is not the freedom of acceptance: mere acceptance is no longer acceptable. It is the freedom of struggle. The freedom to struggle. The freedom to take on life. The freedom to work for change. The freedom to carve out a niche in an indifferent world. I like this struggle, the freedom of this struggle. Over night treatments on the System One reduces dialysis to one of life's details, leaving me to engage in the struggle. I am profoundly thankful.

[okarol]

  Bill - interesting insight.

Happy Thanksgiving to all! 

[del]

Happy Thanksgiving to my friends south of the border.    Hope you count your blesings and have a delicious turkey dinner. Okarol your picture was beautiful!!!

[kitkatz]

The food was good, however I came home fro D with high blood pressure and knocked back a minoxidil, the most powerful pill I have in the BP arsenal.  Dropped it to 116/84 from 230/104 this morning.  Slept most of the monring. Went o Mom and sister's for lunch.  Good turkey. god food, bad mood.  Pill must be giving me the crazies today. Now I am off to rest and relax. I am tired and moody today.



Happy Thanksgiving! Isn't it great those pilgrims survived their first winter, and here we hare several hundred years later!

[Sluff]

I am thankful that I have Okarol, Bajanne, Kitkatz,Boxman and Paris, who puts in countless free hours to keep Epoman's vision alive and exciting at times. Without these people and the Members of IHD, we could not exist. Thank you to everyone who makes this forum what it is today.

[boxman55]

Wow what a feast we had. Went to my sisters and we had all are family and my sisters husband family, about 30 people 2 turkeys and enough side dishes to fill a train. i have left overs to take thru Sunday. I am thankful that we all could be together on the anniversary of my Moms death (7 years). She would of had a wonderful time...Boxman

[G-Ma]

Oh I'm sorry Boxman, however I'm sure there were wonderful memories in that room.
Ann

[skyedogrocks]

What a wonderful day we had!  We went over my sister's house and had tons of great food for the 15 of us there.  Then afterwards the yummy desserts came out and half of us played a rowdy and fun game of Life.  It was a nice day spent with family and friends.  Rob felt great which made me feel even better (thank you NxStage!).  Today Brendan and I are heading back to my sister's for some yummy leftovers and a fun day.  Poor Rob has to work, but it's an easy day for him.