Out to the Spit for a swim.

Today was a great day for me!   My Dialysis Solutions that I have been using  now for one and a half  years, appears to no longer be  giving me the same results as the previous year.  I am getting some bad cramping in my Neck, hands, feet, and even just under my rib cage!  My energy levels have also gone down compared to  prior  months.  We (my kidney doctor and myself ) are  hopeful that these new changes (tweaks) will help.    There are trace minerals in one of the bags of solution,  the  Nutrineal.   The second bag has  less sugar than the third solution.   So I have three bags to hook up to at night now, over an eight hour span,  instead of only two bags, as was the case prior to this visit.     My blood pressure  medication was also lowered again.   I an hopeful that my energy, I  have been experiencing this past couple of days will  continue.   Mike and I met some friends of ours out at the Spit in Comox,  who are up from Mexico, visiting their families.    It was a beautiful sunny day and  evening and  I wanted to go swimming!   How wonderful this  felt!   Swimming is something Mike and I love to do and of course with having a catheter, this along with having  baths are…. usually  out, which I have missed very much the passed twelve months.   I was given  some opsite  Bandage (a very sticky cling wrap bandage) to put over my catheter so I could enjoy a swim once in a while.   I am only allowed in the Ocean and Swimming pools with the bandage on though,  no fresh water unfortunately .  The risk of bacterial infections are too great!   The Ocean was freezing!   I almost wasn’t going to go in until I reminded  my-self that I had on the opsite Bandage and I was not about  to waste one.   So I ran in fast,  so I couldn’t chicken out!     It felt wonderful!   Cold! but wonderful no less.   My Kidney failure has taught me to make the best of each day that I feel good.    I am grateful  for the  good day’s that I am able to enjoy.    It would be a lot harder  to endure the  very difficult days  one can experience with Renal failure, If it were not for  the good day’s that are in  between these long stretches I would go crazy I’m sure of it!   How I look at my situation is… I compare it to our  long rainy stretches we can have  living in B.C. ‘s Rain forest.  These   can be challenging to many!   The sunny breaks in between can most certainly help  to take the edge off a long stretch of rainy winter weeks  and we all welcome these sunny breaks! This out look helps me to appreciate my situation.  So my last swim, out side any ways,  for the year was  today.  Summer is over now ( in my mind any ways)….officially over.  Soon winter will be upon us.  I am grateful for this last plunge into  the ocean to entertain my thoughts over the winter until next summer!   This was a very good Summer and I now look forward to a wonderful Fall and Winter!

Mike took a picture of me with the  opsite bandage applied  so that I could post a picture to show what the bandage looks like.   I  am grateful  for the bandages  provided to me by the Kidney foundation and the freedom to swim that they afford me.  I look forward to taking my grand kids to the pool over the winter because of these bandages!