Dialysis

     Last night ended up being a fairly late night with his first session of dialysis going from about 9-11.   All went well and he didn't really have any complications, and was actually able to sleep through about half of it.   Both of us got a pretty good nights sleep as well.
       Morning brought another round of dialysis.   This one a little bit longer.   They are starting out gently and working up.   During his treatment this morning the nephrology doctors came in and decided to try and have them increase the time of his treatment by a 1/2 an hour and also try and remove some of the excess fluid that has built up in his body by 1/2 Liter.   Things went well until right near the end when there were problems with his blood clotting.   It set off alarms which made Chris pretty nervous, but I know I felt a lot better that the machine was capturing them instead of releasing them back into his body. 
      We talked a bit with his dialysis nurse and found out she was from Peru.   When we asked why she became a dialysis nurse she talked about how she likes it because she's able to watch the patients progress.  Most times as nurse in a hospital you only see a patient for a short time, but with her position she often gets to follow many of them long term and watch them progress.  However, after talking to her a bit more, she opened up and talked about how several of her family and friends in Peru had kidney problems and did not have access to the care they needed and passed away.   She does this in honor of them.   As much as we wanted to avoid dialysis, I'm grateful that we have access to the care that he needs to get better. 
      There was a lot of back and forth about how much longer he would be in the ICU or the hospital in general, but in the afternoon we finally found out that they were moving him to the neuro floor.  Our nurse here, Leanne, has been amazing.   She's so patient and is the doppelganger for one of my old employees/friends, Laurie Jackson.  This room sadly views the same courtyard as the ICU room in May, but it's one step closer to getting back home.