Skip to main content

wanted: hero for life....

A kidney transplant is a surgery to place a healthy kidney from a donor into your body. A donor is a person who has just died or a living person, most often a family member. A kidney from someone who has just died is a deceased donor kidney. A kidney from a living person is a living donor kidney (NIDDK, 2017).
Mr. S was one of our transplant patient in 2017. Kudos to him whose surgery really came in as a surprise.

I've known Mr. S since I transferred to this Clinic. Never was a day in his dialysis treatment that he had no complaint --- be it with his treatment, with his Technician, with my Manager, with his blood works, or even with the floor of the Clinic!

Argh! These rich-bitchy patients sometimes will get into your nerves, but hey you cannot discount it from him because he is generous sometimes and well, he used it to his advantage! Rumor was, he bought his kidney or he brought in a donor from his foreign country. Rumor or not, I am happy for Mr. S and best, I am happy for me! Done were the days I had to explain to him why his potassium is up or why can't I run his blood flow to more than 450 or why can't I pull out 4 kilos in his two-hour stay.  

"I did run your treatment last time to 4 kg and you can't hardly get up from your chair because you were tired" I told him one time; who wouldn't get tired with that fast fluid pull from your system? Your heart will be racing with how fast the blood will get berserk in your system! There was even a time when his blood pressure was super low and he was dizzy, instructed him to rest first and I will check him in 10 minutes; nahhhh he did not listen, stood up, wobbled to the weighing scale! Good he was pretty thin for his tall stature, I easily grabbed him and placed him in the first chair I reached.

Anyhow, I am happy. Oh the day after his surgery he called me in the Clinic to thank us for everything.  He said he will come visit us. I told him to recuperate first, that he cannot be out in the crowd until the doctors will give him a clearance.

It's been two months. I hope Mr. S is doing well and doing his best.  We have transplant patients before that came back to the Clinic to thank us, there is even this one guy who cannot get over the attachment he has with his "former mates" in the Clinic that he still frequents the Clinic just to say "hi" to all of them.

Last Christmas,
I gave you my heart,
but the very next day
your body rejected
the transplant
and you died.

G.




Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Sunday's child...

I may not have a fair face, but I am a Sunday child.  Forty-something years ago, on a wee hours of a Sunday, my mother had a 10-pounder.  I was born from an unfortunate situation of my parents who were in dire need to uproot themselves from the very place they called home since their childhood. Most of my siblings were born and grew up in the same hometown.  So growing up in a very different environ caused havoc to some of my older siblings --- who are unable to see the tin line between leaving and living.  On the other hand, I did not realize the difference between us and them (my older siblings) even they kept teasing me and the other two younger siblings "Moros".  I remembered how I was schooled by my older siblings about the sun, the moon, the stars...and why the sky is way up high.  I've learned how greed can cause you hunger and misery from the story of the monkey and the turtle .  I even learned the eye-flipping story of the pin...

heads or tails...

What's the best part of a fish to chomp on? The head.  Especially when its sinigang or tinola (cooked in soup base) or even grilled. Filipinos has a funny gusto of eating fish, we are used to cooking and serving a whole fish -- with all its head, tail, bones, and skin on!  Which, I know most people in California would gape at a sight of it--- a whole fish! Gawk. Ande cooked dinner yesterday.  She called me saying  "saan ka na" (where are you now?) at 645pm, while I was cruising or actually sitting in the traffic of SR-55 and I-5N.  She said she cooked dinner.  Yes, that's how lucky I am!  I have a rent-free place and a dinner to look forward to. As expected, the one in my soup bowl was a milkfish head... and so in Ande's bowl.  I went back to the kitchen for seconds and found the same heads and some tails of the milkfish in the pot.  Went back to the table, grabbed my eye glasses again as milkfish are really, really bony! ...

Refreshing...

While June was sitting in the lobby, I noticed her face is differently-colored.  Her aura is as translucent as the light bulb behind her.  Well, the monitor of the lobby camera is hidden in my station--- I see everyone and anybody who sets foot in the Kingdom.  Two months ago, there were two bull-necked belligerent guys in my lobby as early as 5AM...I called the cops on them. When June was in the treatment area, I called her attention and told her how refreshing it is to see her smile like she's still playing with her bubble bath--- frothy and fizzy! "Oh yes!  I was in the tub with the running water for 30 minutes!" she replied. Her CVC was removed recently... after one long year!  She said when she was in the hospital for the removal procedure,  she told the Surgeon "it's about time, it's been a year". She was not mad, in fact she was happy, in her mind--- "finally I can take a long shower". So June, tell me, what wi...