23

Jul

7-23-15   Hey Everybody!    Only one more day until the weekend!  I hope you are all doing well tonight as you read these words.  I am feeling pretty good as I am typing them.  I know that the main purpose of this blog is to update friends and family on my progress during recovery but I have to let you know although that's how it started out now it's a little more than that.  This blog has become nightly therapy for me and I would still write even if no one ever read it.  So why don't you

2015

22

Jul

7-22-15   Hey Everybody!    We're halfway through another week and I hope you're all doing well this evening.  I have had a good day.  I am beat.  They took off 2 liters today at dialysis and it kicked my butt.  That usually means that I am dry and we can ease off a little on the amount of fluid that gets taken off at each session.  My legs are also sore from my workout yesterday.  I think I will probably sleep well tonight.  While I'm thinking about it I enjoyed myself so much last weekend

2015

21

Jul

7-21-15    Hey Everybody! I hope you're all doing well tonight.  I am feeling pretty good.  I had a very productive day.  I got through a lot of very tedious file purging and I also had a very good visit from my physiotherapist.  I also had a little accident that turned into a much bigger problem than it should have been but now I know I can deal with something unexpected happening and come out ok.    We'll start with the physiotherapist.  He came by this morning for his second visit with me.

2015

20

Jul

7-20-15   Hey Everybody!    I hope you all had a good weekend and a good first day of the week.  Monday is behind us.  Congratulations!    Since I last wrote I received my lab results from TGH on Thursday.  My INR was 2.25 and my LDH was 493.  The next day at Grand River my numbers were INR- 2.2 and LDH- 921.  Today my INR was down a little because the doctor had me reduce my dosage over the weekend.  The actual number was 1.8.  My LDH was down as well at 870.  Things still seem to be moving

2015

16

Jul

7-16-15   Hey Everybody!    I hope you're all doing well this evening.  Tonight's post may be a little short.  My whole day was about my visit to the LVAD clinic at TGH.    Traffic heading into Toronto wasn't bad at all.  I went to work with Monica this morning so that we could leave immediately after she was done.  We made it to TGH in time to grab a bite to eat in the Atrium before my appointment.  Brisket sandwiches, Lay's Potato Chips, lemonade and mini Snickers bars for dessert were on

2015

15

Jul

7-15-15    Hey Everybody!    I hope you are all doing well on this midweek evening.  We had a gorgeous day here in Kitchener today.  We had plenty of sunshine and a nice breeze the humidity is gone!  I had a good day personally as well.  I'll share some of the highlights with you.   It's Wednesday which is a dialysis day so let's start there.  I had two new nurses today.  I think they're trying to rotate everyone through at least one session with the LVAD guy.  Both of these nurses were

2015

14

Jul

7-14-15   Hey Everybody!    I hope you're all doing well tonight.  I know I'm starting to sound like a broken record but I had another really good day today.  I feel like I've crossed a line from just getting better to getting well.  I'm feeling good and strong and purposeful in my head these days.  My body is responding positvely to this state of mind so I'm trying to keep it up one day at at time.    Man the bottom dropped out of the sky a few times today and it poured rain like we haven't

2015

13

Jul

7-13-15    Hey Everybody!    Another Monday is behind us.  Congratulations!  I hope yours went as well as mine did.  One thing from yesterday first that I forgot to mention last night is about my speakers.  I rechecked all the connections yesterday morning when Monica was out getting the bird cage.  I found a couple of poor connections and I corrected them.  I popped in a dvd and what do you know I heard enriched sound from 3 speakers up front and I felt the gentle rumbling of the bass coming

2015

12

Jul

7-12-15    Hello Everyone!    I hope you all had a good weekend.  I had a very interesting day and I am tired but feeling good.  I am ready to get some rest but first things first.    Today started off well.  I woke up feeling refreshed after a good night's sleep.  I went to work right away on the second bedroom.  I made steady progress while Monica readied the apartment for the arrival of the newest member of our team.  Today was the day that we were going to get our first pet together.

2015

11

Jul

7-11-15    Hey Everybody!    It's Saturday night!  I hope you all are doing well tonight.  I am feeling fantastic!  I just got back from an after dinner walk with Monica and I hit the 30 minutes continuous walking mark tonight.  I am very pumped right now.     I will build on this number in the coming weeks a little more each day.  I have a new goal now thanks to my man Mike the King of the Stress Test.  Mike has challenged me to get my walking up to 42 minutes by August 30th which is the day

2015

10

Jul

7-10-15   Hey Everybody!    Welcome to the weekend!  I hope you are all doing well tonight.  I am feeling fine but pretty tired.  I had a good day and now I am ready to call it a night.    Before I go here are the highlights from today.  I had a good dialysis session today they pulled off 2 liters of fluid setting me up nicely for 2 days without dialysis over the weekend.  My numbers were fantastic INR- 2.1 and LDH- 1039!  The best set of numbers yet.    I was able to get in 34 minutes of

2015

09

Jul

7-9-15    Hey Everybody!    I hope you're all doing well tonight as you read these words.  I had a nice low key day today.  Nothing really exciting to report which I consider to be a good thing.  As a bonus it was a nice day weather wise as well sunny and warm.    I was able to get in 45 minutes of walking today.  That time was divided pretty evenly between 2 walks one this morning and another this afternoon.  It was good to spend some time outside away from the boxes for a little bit in the

2015

08

Jul

7-8-15    Hello Everyone!    I hope you are all doing well this evening.  Congratulations, we're halfway through another week!  2 up and 2 down.  Today was another pretty good day although right now I am a little cold and pretty tired.  A result of the lack of sleep the other night and dialysis today.    They went pretty heavy today at dialysis.  What I mean by that is they went to the maximum range that my body is comfortable with.  The nurse set the machine to pull off 2 liters of fluid

2015

07

Jul

7-7-15    Hey Everybody,    I hope you're all doing well tonight.  I had another good day today.  I didn't sleep well last night but I still had some energy this morning.  So I took my van in to get my passenger window fixed because it was open and wouldn't close.  Thank you Luke for your help this morning.  We took the courtesy shuttle back to Luke's car.  Just before he dropped us off the driver told us the funniest story I have heard in a long time.  Apparently he bought a cat 2 weeks ago.

2015

06

Jul

7-6-15    Hey Everybody,    I hope you all made it through this Monday in good shape.  I had another very good but very tiring day.  It's another late night post so it won't be very long.    I had dialysis as usual to start the week off early this morning.  The bus driver was waiting for me at the door when I got downstairs.  Apparently more streets had been closed due to the construction around the hospital and she was worried about getting her passengers to their dialysis apointments on

2015

05

Jul

7-5-2015    Hey Everybody,    I hope you all had a good weekend.  I am pretty tired but I am feeling very good about things in general and I am feeling pretty good about myself as well.  For the first time during my recovery I feel like I am getting well and not just getting better.  I'm not sure what flipped the switch in my head but it happened earlier this week and the feeling was solidified by my clinic visit on Thursday.    Today a couple of things happened that might seem insignificant

2015

04

Jul

7-4-15    Hey Everybody!    I hope you are all having a great weekend so far and Happy 4th of July to everyone in the good old U-S of A.  I had a fantastic day.  No docctors, no hospitals, no bloodwork, instead I spent the day doing something that I absolutely love to do.  I made pulled pork from scratch on the BGE.  If you've never made pulled pork then you may not know what a time consuming endeavour it can be but that's the part I love about it.  You can't rush it you just have to let it

2015

03

Jul

7-3-15    Hey Everybody!    Happy Friday and Happy 4th of July Eve!  Another week is done and I am glad about it.  This has been a really good week and today ended it nicely.    I had dialysis this morning and that went well.  They did the usual bloodwork and my INR was 1.3 which is way too low and my LDH was 1361 which was a significant drop from Wednesday.  When they did my bloodwork at TGH yesterday the results were my INR was 1.34 and my LDH was 648.  The doctor at Grand River is handling

2015

02

Jul

7-2-15    Hey Everybody!    I hope your all doing well this evening.  I have had an oustanding day today.  I am getting an earlier start  on this posting than I have been lately and that's one more good thing to add to the list of good stuff that's happened today.    First of all let me say thank you to Monica for driving today, for getting us to Toronto and back home safely.  Traffic wasn't as bad as we were told it would be but it was still an 8 hour day.  We left our place at 10 this

2015

01

Jul

7-1-15   Hey Everybody!    Happy Canada Day!    I hope you are all doing well tonight.  I am pretty tired so this will be a short post of just the highlights from today.    I had dialysis this morning and it went well.  My bloodwork came back as my INR is 1.6 after skipping two doses so now I'm back to taking 7mg doses until it gets back over 2.0.  My LDH is 1461 which is a nice drop from last week.  That trend needs to continue.  I have my clinic visit in Toronto tomorrow and they will

2015

30

Jun

6-30-15    Hey Everybody!    I hope all is well with you tonight.  For everyone in Canada, Happy Canada Day Tommorow!  For everyone else Happy Hump Day!    I plan to smoke a pork shoulder tomorrow and make some pulled pork for dinner.  I'll let you know how it turns out.  We spent all day clearing out my old apartment and I mean literally that's all we did all day long.  We just got home about 10 til 10 quite a long day but it feels so good to be in one place finally with all my stuff. I held

2015