1. I zipped up to the clinic this morning having read the latest report of my blood work, knowing that my kidney function had remained stable since I had blood work done back in October at Sacred Heart. That blood work back in October held good news, in fact. A month earlier, my kidney function had fallen to 14%, putting me in the Stage V range, or, as it could be called, the dialysis range. But, in October, the lab report showed that my kidneys had rallied and my function increased to 18%.
Back in September, Dr. Jones told me I might expect this improvement. Because I wasn't showing any symptoms of renal failure -- no water retention, fatigue, metallic taste in my mouth, etc. --, she wasn't alarmed that I'd dipped into the Stage V range, but she did talk with me about options for dialysis, just in case.
Today, Dr. Jones and I were both happy that my kidney function registered at 17% and that within the context of Chronic Kidney Disease, my other numbers looked good.
As Dr. Jones and I talked about my blood work, she told me about patients of hers that have hummed along very well with low kidney function. In fact, one of her patient's function has dipped as low as 10% and she's not on dialysis yet.
How can this be? Like me, these patients don't have ancillary, but deeply connected, health problems: no diabetes, no heart disease, for example. She also told me that these patients who have not had to go on dialysis have maintained what's known as a kidney friendly diet: low potassium and an emphasis on plant over animal protein. My guess is they stay hydrated, too.
This is exactly what I've been doing, especially at home. I am more flexible away from home, eating whatever I'm served and enjoying some variety if I eat out. I've been doing my best to steer clear of high potassium foods and I've reduced the meat I eat. I continue to look up kidney friendly recipes and read more about what I can do in my diet to go easy on my kidneys. Dr. Jones emphasized this morning that the kidneys do better with chicken and fish and that beef and pork make the kidneys work harder.
I returned home feeling encouraged and fortunate. I take pretty good care of myself and am always seeking to improve. I feel very lucky that my medical situation is not complicated by diabetes or other problems. Most of all, I count myself fortunate every day that I wake up and feel good. I don't know how long this will last, but I try not to think much about duration. I try to keep my attention on the day of feeling good I have right now.
2. Even though my visit with Dr. Jones was encouraging and enjoyable, I returned home and was suddenly wiped out and so I put my night clothes back on, put Maggie and Charly on the bed, and crawled under the covers and enjoyed an extended period of restorative afternoon sleep.
3. Back in 1985, I lived alone in a basement apartment on West Broadway in Eugene and I subscribed to cable television. At that time, a local cable channel existed in Eugene. It was KOZY. Its programming centered around movies from the thirties and forties and replays of old television shows. The commercials it ran promoting its programming always featured a clip from a vintage movie which featured someone speaking a line with the word "cozy" in it. Well, I found these old movies fun to watch and I enjoyed coming home from the library at night, popping myself a bowl of popcorn, and watching reruns of Father Knows Best.
I bring this up because this evening I decided to lighten up the content of my movie viewing and decided to watch some old black and white movies and decided I wanted them to be British. I suddenly realized that I'd never watched Basil Rathbone/Nigel Bruce playing Sherlock Holmes and Watson, so I watched an hour long Sherlock Holmes movie, Terror by Night (1946). It was perfect.
For some reason, this movie inspired me to want to see a vintage black and white Alec Guiness movie. I reminisced within myself about a Saturday back in 2014 when I took the train from Alexandria to Silver Spring to the American Film Institute Cultural Center to watch two Easling Studio masterpieces from 1951 starring Alec Guiness: The Lavender Hill Mob and The Man in the White Suit. Tonight, I rented another Alec Guiness comedic masterpiece, Last Holiday (1950). In it, Guiness plays an ordinary, lonely tractor salesman who finds out he has only a short time to live and so withdraws all of his savings and takes up residence in a posh hotel. I loved the movie's first forty-five minutes before I had to turn it off and go to bed and very much look forward to finishing the movie and finding out what remarkable things happen to this most unremarkable man when he decides to live as if he has nothing to lose -- except his life.
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