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Monday 17 February 2014

Back to square one with the peritoneal dialysis catheter...

The lack of posting has been due to the fact that I've been in hospital for the past two weeks and I've been home for  just over a week recovering. I got given a date to come in and get my hernia sorted out pretty much straight away and was told to come in to hospital on January 16th.

I was actually feeling quite well before I went in despite the hernia I had, however the hernia needed sorting out and my amazing CAPD nurse managed to get me slotted in with a surgeon quickly so it was sorted out.

So what's been happening? Well all I can say is that I've probably had the roughest ride of my life the past few weeks.

I went in for surgery on Friday 17th January and I came round in the recovery room in quite a lot of pain. :( Before going into surgery I had built up this wall of fear and anxiousness as I was worried because of how bad it was last time I went to surgery. Whilst in surgery they decided to reposition the catheter so it would stop causing me pain on a regular basis. However the surgery revealed that it wasn't actually a hernia and I didn't need a hernia repair... Instead I had a bizarre leak of peritoneal dialysis fluid which was in a little sac around the anchor of my PD catheter. The surgeon ended up replacing the whole catheter rather than repositioning it so when I awoke it was the surgery I had done in June all over again.

One of the daily pains I got with my last catheter was than if I never had any fluid in I would get this sharp twinging pain near my bladder which the doctor said was my catheter sat on a nerve above my bladder. It was highly uncomfortable and painful. However this time I woke up and that pain was there constantly. I couldn't actually believe it and I thought the whole thing was back to square one.

I'm not sure if I'm just a big moaner and I need to get over myself. But on Friday night I was in severe pain and pretty much screaming with it on the ward. My boyfriend and family were helpless with it all but I was grateful to have them there.

After a crazy cocktail of painkillers I finally settled and started to rest and the recovery has been a slow and painful one. Also because I had not been getting adequate dialysis with the so called hernia that I had. My levels were now going crazy and all over the place and my heart was fluttering due to high potassium levels. 

I also came round from surgery with a temporary haemodialysis line hanging out of the side of my neck! The whole thing was very inconvenient and in an awful place. This temporary line was so that I could have haemodialysis instantly after the surgery. 

The awkward temporary haemodialysis catheter.





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