What did you think the Capabilities of A Kidney Patient Before You Were One?

[tamara]

I thought that people with kidney patients would be on deaths door. Didn't think that people with kidney failure would be able to work, etc.
What did you think?






EDITED:Moved to work topic-kitkatz,moderator

[George Jung]

I didn't think about it.  Guess I would have considered it to be like any life threatening disease.  Being a kidney patient now, I do feel as if death is close (closer than ever before) and my abilities are not as they once were.  I am not for downplaying the seriousness of failed kidneys regardless of things I am able to do(I don't make it out to be more than it is but I certainly don't take away either).  I am not what I was before

[Ang]

never  really  gave  it  alot  of  thought,just  a  normal  run  of  the  mill  sicknes,but  as  they  say  you've  got  to  experience  it  ,  to  understand  it keep  up  the  fight





EDITED: Fixed  icon error - Sluff/ Admin

[tweetykiss]

I am not a dialysis patient but I wish to answer this anyway....I use to think they were at death's door but after learning about kidney disease and making friends here, I have learned there is plenty of life on dialysis and the patient can live a long life.....I know adjustments have to be made as far as schedules and diets.......

[rimbo74]

Before I had kidney failure I thought that when it was going to happen, that it would mean an end to a normal life.  No work, non-stop trips to the doctor, etc.  I didn't think this was going to happen to me until I was in my 50's or 60's.  Being 32 when it occured and have now been on PD for 5 months, its hasn't changed my life too much except that I don't feel that great all the time and kind of tire easily.  I still live my life like I used to although I don't want to continue on dialysis for very much longer.  Thank goodness I have my brother as a donor.

[glitter]

I worked and went to school with a young man who had some kind of kidney diease and was on dialysis when I was a teenager. He was really tired all the time, then he died when he was 20.  I was really really shocked when he died- I had no clue. Then when my husband became a dialyzor, I thought he would be an invalid. I did not realize how productive his life potential is still-thankfully I know  now.

[Sluff]

I did not know anything, never gave it a thought. 

[st789]

Clueless but from reading this site, individual result is vary.  Some may have to do with the one up there as the deciding factor.

Rerun had her transplanted kidney for 20 yrs., while another girl at her clinic passed away 3 months after the surgery.

[Adam_W]

I never really knew too much about kidney failure before I had it, except from my grandmother, who also has it. I was really afraid that when she went on dialysis (which she still has not had to do yet), her life would pretty much be over, and I was dreading when that day would come. I felt the same about myself when I was told that I had to start dialysis, but I realize now that, although it does suck, it's not totally the end of the world.

Adam

[twirl]

I thougt it onlly happened to older people...much older

[Psim]

I thought going on dialysis or having a transplant were cures that would fix everything, not a problem, ride into the sunset, live happily ever after. Then I got to be friends with someone whose sister was on dialysis... and man did I get an education.

[bolta72]

I also had no clue and really paid no attention to it. Boy, do I know now.

[KT0930]

I already was a kidney patient, but a very young one, so I guess this counts...

When I would go for clinic after my first transplant, I would walk past the hemo unit, and the doors were always open. I saw these very sick, weak people attached to a machine with tubes everywhere. I remember thinking, "Wow, those people are REALLY sick. I sure hope I'm never like them." I had no idea what I was looking at (I was eight).

[kitkatz]

Not a clue.  Not one clue.

[Chris]

I knew very little next to nothing about it. Only thing I had seen was a kidney transplant on tv.

[CW]

I knew nothing of kidney disease before I became a patient. However when I first became sick I was brought to the hospital clinic and all I could think was "this looks like some sick science experiment"

[flip]

I didn't have a clue either. On my first visit to a dialysis center, I saw all these people coming out in wheel chairs or escorted by nurses and I was terrified of what was in store for me.

[okarol]

I thought there was an organ bank and you just had to sign up for a kidney. 

[G-Ma]

me too okarol and I then thought a transplant was a "cure"...boy was I wrong.