Going Monday-Wednesday-Friday from 3-7PM at my favorite dialysis chain’s other local location. It’s a small improvement so far.

I don’t care to say anything more about it for now. It is what it is. For the record, I don’t really think that idiom reflects a good way to deal with most circumstances. If it were, I’d still be at the other location. I used the word “idiom”.

9/28/2009
My dialysis schedule wrecks havoc with my schedule…To be blunt, I’m not liking the overnight schedule at all. In a nutshell, six out of seven days a week are directly impacted by dialysis. Either my day ends prematurely by having to head over at 9AM, or my day begins anew in a jarring, undignified way between 5 and 6AM…I don’t want to “get used to this”

10/3/2009
I woke up at 3AM this morning in the usual cold sweat that I’ve had every time I’ve been dialyzed. When your clothes cling to your body and you feel clammy like this, it’s doubtful you’re going to be able to fall back asleep. Around 4:30, I figured I’d try to get back to sleep for the final hour. And then the ridiculously bright overhead fluorescents came on a 4:45. So much for my intentions.

10/13/2009
You do not tell me I have a spot on the overnight shift, and, after I arrive on time and start dialyzing late due to your staff’s inefficiencies, tell me at 6AM after a typically unpleasant morning, that I need to hurry up and get moving because there’s a woman in the lobby who wants to get started. Do not *#*$(#$*#( do that again, please.

10/15/2009
It’s been very tough to get used to. I have not slept well. It’s generally been stressful. But I’m trying to fight through it, because the eight-hour treatment is supposedly better for my body. The good news is that they did make a change to better accommodate me. Last night, I got a bed in a different spot, without so many bright lights and the pressure of needing to make room for a new patient in the morning. For perhaps the first time, I actually slept pretty well. But that still means a harsh wake-up around 5:30. It will continue to take getting used to.

11/22/2009
The nocturnal dialysis shift, in particular, should be quiet and peaceful, but it is often anything but. The volume of conversation is completely inappropriate…Staff moves about, practically stomping on the floor to the point that my bed vibrates. Staff acts like this is happy hour at a bar rather than a sensitive patient environment..And I cannot imagine that I can tolerate it much longer, let alone potentially YEARS…I do not think I am unreasonable to expect a PROFESSIONAL environment, where SINCERE efforts are made to limit noise and disruption and disregard for patients’ well-being…When I have to begin my day with the chaos in that room, IT RUINS MY DAY…I need ******* to shape up…or I need to get out of there.

1/10/2010
Maybe I ought to go back to the 6am shift. That was loud, too, but I’d manage to fall asleep…I’ve been very worn-out on Tuesdays and Thursdays at work, so the overnight shift of dialysis isn’t necessarily the best thing for my job.

2/3/2010
I can still hear Mr. X’s bellowing and frequent laughter, puncturing any peace I hope to have here at dialysis, which is a hopelessly unpleasant experience…I desperately want quiet here at dialysis, but I know I’m never going to get it.

2/10/2010
It’s 11:21. Mr. X is either on the phone or chatting up another patient. Through my earplugs, headphones, and audiobook that’s at full-volume, I still hear his booming voice. I cannot fall asleep, even with a sleep mask on, while the horrid lights, are on above me, by the dozen. The lousiest part of this is that I KNOW my Thursday is already screwed.

3/24/2010
Mr X is as loud as he’s ever been tonight. I want to leave duct tape on his bed… I hate this. Lack of peace. Lack of privacy. Feeling lousy after I come off, so I either go back to sleep and miss part of the workday, or I make it into work and feel horrible.

4/15/2010
I could argue that I might not have bronchitis right now if the temperature at dialysis didn’t dip to 58 degrees last Wednesday night…It doesn’t say a lot for my dialysis treatments when I choose to stay home for the good of my health.

4/21/2010
I came into dialysis tonight and immediately heard The Tech’s gospel blaring from the radio from 75 feet away…Sub Nurse dared to complete turn off the radio…The Tech was not amused.

5/1/2010
3am… No one has popped open a can of Coors Light, so why have blasts of Rocky Mountain air been enveloping my dialysis bed?

5/26/2010
There’s no incentive for them to address my issues in a meaningful manner.

6/4/2010
There’s no reason why the radio should still be on at 11:54. This is ridiculous.


6/22/2010
I can feel myself catching pneumonia. I’m not exaggerating. Waking up covered in cold sweat. Frigid air blowing on me. Hooked up to dialysis machine so no way to get any relief. I’ve gotten bronchitis and sore throats from this. This unbearable sweaty freeze. I’ll feel the consequences later. They don’t take this seriously. Fixing the AC cuts into their bottom-line. I’m too exhausted to fight anymore.

7/9/2010
Dialysis still a pain in the ass. No one left to blame. Garrulous patients, waking up to sweats, waking up to frigid air, being paralyzed in deep sleep after coming home, feelin feverish the entire time i am at work…no desire to do anything productive after work on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

7/17/2010
It really is THAT bad. Spend an hour in a sauna. Then stick your head in a freezer for a half hour. This was dialysis for me this morning. I must record that THIS is not acceptable. I must figure out something else.

7/22/2010
I’ve figured out something else.

I’ve listed them on FreeSell. I will be happy to let blog readers be considered for this once-in-a-life VHS film opportunity.
Write me back with details if interested. All or none!

So people are supposedly going to enthusiastically vote for Republicans in November, but on what premise? More tax cuts? Tax cuts were the legacy of George W. Bush. Shall we just try that again?

Tax Cuts vs. Stimulus
This is from conservative financial type folks:
(h/t Bob Cesca)

I’m really pissed that Democrats have caved time and time again over the last 18 months. The stimulus needed to be a lot bigger. They couldn’t sell it. Health care needed to be bolder. They couldn’t sell it. And basic measures to try to push the economy along are token measures.

But they’ve a least got the country pointed in the right direction, if not headed there. I don’t see how putting Republicans back in power can possibly help.

And that wouldn’t change my almost-made-up mind that I want my stint with nocturnal dialysis here to be over. It’s been ten months, and I don’t think it has worked as well for me as I think it could. My mental momentum is toward trying something else as soon as possible. I have a good idea what that next thing will be. I’ll write about if and when it becomes official.

In the meantime, I will try to make the most of my potentially final night here. I will watch Rachel Maddow. I’ll put up that promised latest-pet-pics post.

I will try to get to sleep by 11:00 and get six solid hours of sleep. I will put a ball cap on my head when I wake up at 5:00, and I presumably my sweaty cold head is in need of relief.

(I’ll post some pet pics tomorrow, lighten things up…)

Spend an hour in a sauna. Then stick your head in a freezer for a half hour. This was dialysis for me this morning.

But I don’t believe for a second that this is how it needs to be. I am supposedly doing so well on dialysis…at least my labs say so. I can’t help but think I actually could be doing well on dialysis.

But not here. It’s never going to work here.

And when my blood pressure has dropped lower than usual, and my soaking head is freezing, and it’s a huge task to pack up my bedding and belongings, the tech could give me a couple of minutes before scrubbing down the machine that is inches from the bed. There is no room for me to do what I’m doing while she’s doing that. I think it’s common courtesy. But after almost 11 months here–holy sh*t, it’s been THAT long–I should not be and am not surprised.

I must record that THIS is not acceptable. I must figure out something else.

As a severely depressed thirteen-year-old back in 1989, my therapist encouraged me to write down my thoughts. I started a journal in a spiral-bound notebook, and I never really stopped.

That journal goes online to the world starting now. I’ll have to transcribe it, but, for the time being, I’m planning to work on that.

Why am doing this? What purpose can it possibly serve? I know it’s all very painful. It’s obviously all very private.

The main reason is that the thirteen-year-old who was writing it desperately did not want it to be private. He grew to write as if there was an audience, as if there was someone who cared about what he was thinking and feeling. If he was going to overcome the nightmare of that horrible depression, he wanted to chronicle how he triumphed over it. Or, if he never overcame it, he wanted people to understand how it destroyed him.

Enough of the third-person. I wrote in my journal for years with the fantasy that my writings were going to be thoughts that others would read someday, and the idea that I was not having these thoughts in a vacuum kept me going at times.

I do not claim that these will help anyone. I wonder if going through these may help me, although I tend to think it will not.

I have been a brutal critic of myself for over twenty years. I frankly don’t know how to give myself a break. Putting the journal out there is a way of given myself, at least my miserable teenage self, a break.

There will be plenty that’s embarrassing, perhaps even humiliating. And it may be embarrassing or humiliating for people I care about. Like with my current-day blog Toastiest, I won’t ever directly use my name. I know people either know or easily can find out who I am, but this slight act of censorship is meant as a way to protect myself and my family. But it’s important for me to put this out there.

I remember wishing I could have an index of journals, and I even began such a project with pen and paper once, jotting down people and topics and noting dates next to them. My younger self would be thrilled that I can put all of this out there, with tags and in a searchable database. My younger self was, after all, I huge geek, and as I’ve implied, had very little in life to be thrilled about. So I am excited that I can do this for…myself.

I tried a similar endeavor a couple of years ago. Called “toastie97″, it was an attempt to transcribe my journals from my college years. Even though it was 13 or 14 years later, I still felt compelled to give every single name a pseudonym. I did not want anyone I know now or knew then to have to have their real names associated with Toastie when even I wasn’t publishing my name. I only put a couple of months up there before deciding it was an awful thing for my psyche, and I stopped. toastie97.com is now somone’s link farm.

There will be no pseudonyms on the new site, or at least I don’t know what circumstance might cause me to use any.

I’ve picked a WordPress.com site for now. I don’t know if I like the blog name, and maybe I’ll change it later. I’ll link to it here, but I don’t know if I’ll comment much on it here in the future, or if I’ll keep my reflections to that site. I imagine I’ll have a few quotes relevant for 2010 from time to time.

http://pretoastie.wordpress.com