The following week (Wednesday the 8th) they called Bryce with the results while he was at work. He came home that evening and didn't seem quite his usual self. He was quiet and I could tell his thoughts were off somewhere else. I mentioned it, he said he was fine. But as the time wore on I knew something else was up.
So when the kids went to bed I approached him about it again. He admitted rather reluctantly, that they'd gotten the results of his bloodwork. His kidney was failing. It was official. They told us that would mean surgery and dialysis at the center, monthly appts with Dr. Senekjian. We didn't know exactly what dialysis was or what it entailed so we weren't nearly as bummed out about starting it as we would have been if we had known. We did know it wasn't good though. And that it would change our lives for forever.
This was all so new, even though Bryce had done it before it was very different this time around. We weren't sure how to handle it, what to say or what to do next. There was some time spent just floating around, with this life changing diagnosis but not sure what we needed to do next or what it meant for now.
Luckily, the doctors are very on top of it and took the steps to move us into what came next. Dr. Senekjian doesn't have admitting privileges at the hospital here, so he told Bryce he could either come up to Ogden for his hospitilizations and surgeries (which was nice he gave us the option, but it wasn't possible) or he could give Bryce's info to a nephrologist here, Dr. Hammond, in Provo who could oversee Bryce's care, hospitilizations, surgeries and dialysis all while keeping Dr. Senekjian in the loop. Obviously, that was the only clear choice so that's what we decided to do.
Side note: That weekend we were scheduled to make a road trip to Missouri to see my family for my Dad's 60th birthday (we'd been planning the party/reunion with my siblings for months). Not understanding the urgency of dialysis we naively thought we could have still made the trip.
On Thursday (the 9th), Dr. Hammond called to let us know Bryce would have to go to the hospital that weekend and have a chest catheter put in for dialysis and fistula surgery. We had no idea what either of those was, and no one bothered to explain it to us. We were given instructions to show up at Outpatient surgery Friday morning at 6AM. My sister Marianne came to stay with the kids and we planned to spend the majority of the day there, but then come home that evening.
We got there to check in and they started asking us questions to verify "So you're here for fistula surgery?" "You're staying the weekend?" And we had to say "We don't know. They told us it would just be outpatient surgery." They looked at us like we were crazy, and obviously this was a surgery that required a hospital stay. We very in he the dark about all of it, which was a really scary, frustrating place to be. So much of this whole situation was completely out of our control, and anyone who knows me knows I don't like being out of control 😁
They got us checked in and headed back to a room, waiting to go into surgery. The vascular surgeon, Dr. Ballard, came in and said "I'll be doing your fistula surgery today huh?" We said "That's what they tell us!" I think it was pretty clear from that response that we were really uninformed about what this all meant. He took a few minutes to explain the fistula; the what, why, who and how. It takes 6-8 weeks at the least for the fistula to be strong enough to use for dialysis, and in the mean time Bryce needed treatments. So on Friday morning they took him back to put in his chest catheter and get him started on dialysis right away at the hospital.
Here is an illustration of the chest catheter and the fistula
Surgery only took about an hour, and he was in quite a bit of pain afterwards in his right shoulder where they put the catheter in. He woke up more as the day wore on though and was in a bit better mood. He was pretty upset he had to stay in the hospital all this time. He felt fine, but apparently it had been Dr. Hammond's plan all along we would stay thru the weekend, although once again no one bothered to tell us that! We still get upset about it, there was no reason he couldn't have come home over the weekend and returned Monday morning for surgery. 😤
Saturday evening Bryce's Mom came down to help for the weekend, so she got some time to visit with him. Sunday we brought the kids up to the room after church and Moff joined us with Mom and we all had a good time in the room.
Some of the fun from the hospital room Sunday evening
Monday morning dawned bright and early, his fistula surgery was scheduled for 6AM, so I woke up and headed to be there before he went back and I could wait in the waiting room. If you've never spent any time in a hospital waiting room, I'd say wear that badge of pride! It was a great reminder though that there are other people and families facing much more serious health issues. In all things be grateful!
I'd be lying if I said I wasn't relieved when the surgery was over (it was only about three hours) and Bryce was back in his room. He spent the day recovering- sleep, wake up, ask for pain meds, repeat. I spent time texting family and binge watching the Game Show Network.
As soon as Bryce was able to be awake for longer than 5 minutes at a time, he started pushing them to let him go home. Tuesday afternoon he was doing well enough they discharged him and he came to rest and get feeling better here at home. He was back to work Wednesday and ready to get back to normal life. Or at least normal as we now knew it.
