No Rejection!

The title of this blog pretty much sums it up: no rejection!

Yesterday I was out running errands when I got a call from Joaquin's nurse. She said, "Meghan? I have good news! His Prograf level was crazy high." And so that solves the mystery of the high creatinine! We both agreed that we've never been happier to see a high Prograf level. It's not a good thing for it to be high but it eases our fears. 

When Prograf levels are too high it can cause the creatinine to be high. His BUN was looking excellent and I don't know if you remember from way back when in October 2006 but I explained that when the creatinine and the BUN rise together it usually indicates that a person needs more fluids because they are too "dry." When creatinine rises without the BUN, that's worrisome. We knew he wasn't dehydrated, so what was causing the rise? The two main culprits are usually high Prograf or rejection. Usually, but not always. The nurse said that she hadn't even spoken with the doctors yet, but that she just called me right away to tell me. When she had called I had just parked the car so after I got off the phone with her I sat in my car and screamed at the top of my lungs. Talk about relief. I called Chris right away and his first words were: "I knew it!"

At the end of September he had a high creatinine reading and it was caused by high Prograf. The next creatinine reading was at his usual .3 so we really clung to the hope that everything was alright since his creatinine had come down since that higher reading (.6, I believe). So all we are needing to do is just adjust meds accordingly and that should fix the creatinine.

Relief. Oh my. Such relief. This week was a nightmare. It brought back so much of the same fear, uncertainty and worry that we were feeling around the time of transplant. Such an awful place to be. It's a helpless place to be, especially as a mother. There were times I would look at Joaquin and wonder, "Is this it? Has our worst fear come true?" I would feel a sense of peace but the fears would wash over me and drown that feeling so quickly. Time seemed to slow to a snail's pace - the agony of waiting and wondering is maddening. 

Joaquin's renal ultrasound went well. Usually the technicians don't say much and don't have much information to offer either because they don't know or don't feel it's their place to tell. When we first arrived Joaquin had been sleeping and so when he first started looking at his belly he noticed his bladder was full. I asked if we should jump up and empty it and he said no, he can wait until we're almost done. So we spent about 10 minutes peering inside of Joaquin's abdomen. The kidney was just relaxing in there. It's amazing how they look like actual kidney beans. It looked smaller then I remember but then again, Joaquin is bigger than the last time I'd seen the kidney on the screen. That's my kidney in there, I remember thinking to myself. Joaquin was a little nervous about this whole ultrasound business but we assured him there would be no poking, nothing would hurt him. He was fascinated by the whole experience too.

So after about 8 or 10 minutes the technician told us to go use the restroom and then we would finish up after that. So I take Joaquin into the restroom. At the beginning of the appointment a nurse (I'm assuming, she never introduced herself, but she was kind and smiley) had come into the room to observe and maybe help if need be. When we were in the restroom I hear them talking in low tones so I couldn't make out much of what they were saying, the only word I could make out was "rejection." Of course, my stomach dropped. I hadn't planned on asking about how things were going but after that I felt like maybe this guy knew something so we walked out and got Joaquin back on the table. I asked him, "So, how are things going?" I don't honestly remember what he said to that but then I asked, "When we were in the bathroom I heard you say something about rejection. What was that about?" And he went on to explain that ultrasounds can be diagnostic tools in assessing whether a kidney was in rejection but that there was arguments amongst the ultrasound community as to how good ultrasounds are at truly diagnosing rejection. He went on to say that his number looked good, the kidney looked nice and profused, etc. So I walked away from the appointment feeling good. And Chris said, "Why would he bullsh*t you if you were going to find out the news anyway?" True. 

So.... everything is okay now. Chris and I held Joaquin's hands before going in for the ultrasound and said a prayer for a happy kidney and a return to our "normal" life (again, what does normal mean? See my thread for our definition of it.) And it looks like our prayer was answered. I feel bad for losing a grip on my faith in Joaquin's kidney. I've always felt like everything would be okay, even from the beginning. It's like I had to go to those dark places in order to get to the positive place. It was awful but I made my way through somehow. Actually, I know how. 

I said this in an email today but I wanted to make sure everyone heard it: Thank you for helping me through this time. Thank you for the voices of logic and rationality when I had none. Thank you for keeping me level headed.