Women With Chronic Kidney Disease Face Unique Challenges...

So the article states "Women with Chronic Kidney Disease face unique challenges"

DUH! 

I mean it is a good read but I feel like I could have wrote this article myself having lived through it. I believe kidney disease is hard for anyone of any age, race, or sex but I do think that it is especially hard for women. Imagine how it feels for those of us who started dialysis young. My 16 & 17 year old friends did not understand why I just stopped coming to school, or why I couldn't eat pizza because there is a lot of potassium and sodium in the tomato sauce and phosphorous in the cheese, or why I couldn't hang out and drink a 40 because my fluid allowance for the entire day was 32 ounces. All my friends were graduating from high school, developing friendships and relationships and my life was full of dietary restrictions, depression, self-esteem issues (ask me how easy it is to feel sexy in your 20's with a catheter in your neck and scars all over your body), and it all revolved around being attached to a machine at 6 am Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for nearly 4 hours if I wanted to survive. Then if my sites decided to be difficult and bleed for a while or my blood pressure dropped because I was pulling off 8-11 pounds of fluid at a time that 4 hour treatment could easily turn into 5 or 6 hours and then being dehydrated, exhausted, and useless the rest of the day. And then there is the fact that your kidneys to so much more than just filter and clean your blood. They also stabilize electrolytes, produce hormones that regulate blood pressure, stimulate red blood cell production, and aid in parathyroid function which helps keep your bones strong. 95% of the time, I was there alone. I drove myself there, I drove myself home. I had no choice. Not that someone is expected to sit and hold my hand for every treatment but considering this all started when I was a teen and it was all just so much for me to take in. I don't know if I ever truly did 'take it in' but rather give it to God and go on autopilot. There were days that after leaving the clinic I was in such a fog and literally just so wiped out that I wouldn't even remember driving home. They didn't have as many options and advances in treatment as they do now, I could not do Peritoneal or home dialysis and finish high school like you can now. I was already living out on my own with my boyfriend (who later became my husband, then ex-husband) and even if home dialysis were an option we did not have the room in our tiny apartment to be able to do so. All we wanted was for me to be "normal" again so that we could get married and start a family. No one explained that this disease was going to affect my life in every way, shape, and form including having that family of my own that I had always dreamed about. THAT should be a huge part of the patient education. Not just throwing out a bunch of medical terminology and then releasing the patient to a clinic full of workers who are there for a paycheck not a passion. I was lucky enough to have been on dialysis before healthcare workers became salaried zombies and my dialysis team was my family not just healthcare providers. The patients that I mentor now all tell me how the employees typically treat them poorly, and they are not allowed to develop any type of "friendships" with their technicians and nurses. I don't know how people make it through in-center dialysis now seeing as all of the reports I get seem to be similar. Technicians and nurses along with the social workers even in some cases just punching a clock for an hourly wage and acting as if you are interfering with THEIR day. I try to encourage my patients to speak up just as I did. I was the patient advocate in our clinic and because many of the older patients had concerns or complaints but were afraid of retribution, I took the issues to the social worker on their behalf so that they could remain anonymous. As society continues to harden itself to the plight of our fellow humans these cases of neglect and blatant disregard of patient care standards is only going to get worse if it is not addressed now. Knowing all of that, ask yourself. Does dialysis sound like a welcoming option for a person already trying to adjust to having a chronic and life-threatening illness?

Love your kidneys my friends because trust me, you do not want to be on this side of the disease.