Long Weeks and Waiting…

Over the next month, we would go through a half dozen appointments and clinic days.

Jeff even had to be admitted to Jackson Memorial Hospital for a Transesophageal Echocardiography (TEE), which is a special imaging procedure to check heart function. As opposed to a traditional echocardiogram, the TEE uses a thin tube that passes through your mouth, down your throat and into your esophagus. So, not really a fun day. But I will explain more later why this is important, and not necessarily required for all kidney patients.

We ended up getting a hotel afterward because he was too weak to travel home! With kidney function so low already, it takes much longer for the anesthesia to flush out of his system, so it was best to let him rest. Plus I felt safer with him resting in the hospital, in case anything else came up or didn’t go as planned with his recovery.

Jeff had already completed his full-day workup prior to this, which was quite similar to mine. Or should I say mine was quite similar to his!

We were able to enjoy the 4th of July holiday with family, which was an amazing healing time that we weren’t sure we would have before the surgery date was called. I think our expectations for that phone call were a bit too high, based on all the “rush” appointments they had us do that made things feel like they were moving quickly.

Each appointment would finish with a conversation on the drive home. “After this we should definitely get some answers”, “I think we’ve done everything they’ve asked”, and on we’d go.

These were encouraging conversations for both of us, because we were grasping at everything positive and just trying to motivate each other. It was all we had to go on!