DOWN BUT NOT OUT
My name is Woody it's really my nickname. I'm a 51 years old, Africian American who has End Stage Renal Disease. Meaning kidney failure. I have been on dialysis since May, 1999. Let's just say to me that was the beginning of my demise of health. You see I use to be a cross country truck driver who ran the road for 30 years or so. I was blessed in 1986 to find and train a lovely young lady to be my co-partner in life as well as work. We drove as a team as a husband and wife team. Well I was coming down with a real bad cold, so I thought. I never really had poor health in my younger days. So I was buying all kinds of over the counter cold remedies to eleviate my symptoms, not knowing all the long that I had high blood pressure and the medicines I was taking had antihistamines in them which can also elevate you blood pressure. Well to make a long story short, I was eating and trying to see when I told my wife I think I'm going blind. I couldn't see the doorway in the restaurant where we were eating.
She took me to the emergency room at the local hospital and there I was told that my kidneys were shutting down. I was immediately put on dialysis. My blood pressure was 253/151, the doctor said it was a blessing that I didn't have a stroke. We were stuck in Jersey City, NJ when this transpired. I was so scared I thought I was going to die right then and there. All I remember was I want to come home. Back where I know some familiar faces and close to my family.
Well back at home I had to find a nephrogolist who was going to take care of me. I live in the midsouth Little Rock, AR to be exact. Whether people believe me or not racism still exist in the twentyfirst century. I have seen how the color of your skin also determines how some people including doctors treat you. It's also ashame how your medical treatment is determined by the type of insurance you have. So since I was a hard working labor who didn't have the best of insurance; I have only my government to help me through Medicare. By the way, I was declared 100% full disabled once I was diagnosed with E.S.R.D. We really didn't have any money saved up and never saw this medical disaster oncoming. I all hit like a ton of brick at once.
Since becoming disabled with kidney failure my health has been slowly declining. I was put on a very powerful drug called "Monoxidal" brand new or generically called "Loniten". I was told my physician who administered it to me that "one of the side effects are it will make you extremely hairy." That was basically the only warning that he said. Four months into taking this drug, I started to experiencing difficulty breathing. At first I thought I was too full of fluid. Everytime I tried to lay down I feel like I was drowning. I started having trouble swallowing anything to eat or drink. At that point my wife took me to the hospital. They gave me an Ecocardiagram to see what was going on in my upper chest area. Low and behold my wife gasped as she was looking at the machine. The cardialogist said "My God your husband's heart in surrounded in a lake of fluid trapped in his pulmonary sac. He was immediately taken to surgery and a drain window was put in his pulmonary sac to extract the fluid. In total there was 4200 cc of fluid on him. Dr. C.D. Williams world reknown cardialogist said "in all my years of surgery he had never seen this much fluid on a person heart and the fact that he was not dead was anything short of a miracle." My regular cardialogist Dr. Joe Hargrove asked me whether or not I was on Monoxidal. I told him yes and he said that was what caused the fluid to build up on my heart. I was trapped and even dialysis could not pull it off. I survived that episode.
I've had my gallbladder removed. In 2007 I was diagnosed with arteroclerosis (severe vascular disease, hardening of the arteries). I had my left leg amputated below the knee and 45 days later I had my right leg amputated above the knee (up to my thigh). In 2009 my left arm where I take my dialysis treatment, clogged up and became inflammed where it was almost amputated. I had wound vac treatment to restore my artery and arm. I also have had my back lumbar L-5 - L-3 rebuilt and also my Cervic C-3 was collapsing. I have 7 screws 3 1/2 inches placed in my neck to keep it in place.
My wife quit her job in October of 2007 in order to be my full time caregiver and if it wasn't for The Almighty Creator and the undying love from my wife, my life would have ended a long time ago.
I have never had to ask for any help in my life. We survive solely on my Social Security Benefits. My monthly allotment is less than $1,000 after they take out for my medical of $96 monthly. We are living under the poverty status. My wife's back is slowly degenerating due to age and picking me up to get in our 1999 Chevy. My handicap ramp is in need of repairing and we also really need a handicap van with a ramp or a lift. I would like to apply for a grant under my disablity status to see if I am eligible for this grant.
