Life on the list

"Sooo...if you stopped dialysis, how long would it take you to die?" Katie asked me over juice and Bourbons yesterday. It sounds like a morbid topic of conversation for a sunny Thursday afternoon, but fortunately it is not something I am squeamish about. Unfortunately, for 5 renal failure patients a day, this disease proves fatal, but the extreme potential of kidney failure is something I came to terms with a long time ago; yes, I might die from kidney failure, but you might get hit by a bus tomorrow. And then maybe I'd get your kidney. Katie's blunt question came as part of a larger discussion we were having about the general societal attitude towards donation. The fact that only around 25% of the population are currently willing to donate their organs suggests that most people have a very negative perception of the process - if only this were true. Whilst there are those who do have a strong moral, physical or religious objection to donating (and have a clear and ...

I have two settings when it comes to clothes: ultra-smart secretary sex kitten and ASBO casual. The latter is what could be described as "hospital wear", which is to say, anything that facilitates sitting still for four hours and provides easy access to my left arm. A fashion show on Bostock ward would include a startling array of hospital gowns and old men without much clothing at all, so even in my battered jeans-and-t-shirt-combo, sartorially speaking, I fare quite well. The former, however, is the look I adopted for work in order to feel authoritative and efficient and I chose my outfits according to the classes I was teaching that day. For my sweet Year 7s, leggings and a long cardigan sufficed; my Year 9s needed sleek black and power shoulders. Yesterday, I took the first step in going back to work. I had an interview with the lovely Ellie at a recruitment agency that specialises in, amongst other things, placing teaching assistants in London schools. To look the part...

It is a rare day that I am eager to get to dialysis, but today is one of those days: I am hungover. Having felt fine earlier this morning, I now have the shakes and a hint of nausea, compounded by dizziness and the general malaise associated with mild alcohol poisoning. During the worst hangovers of my university days, I often lay prone, moaning softly, and lusted after the ability to somehow clean out my system and rapidly expel all the murky toxins. Dialysis, take a bow. In a couple of hours, my blood will be filtered, cleaned and returned to me; I will feel as though I never had a drink and be thinner and healthier as well. It's all Andy's fault. He bought the bottle of wine home to accompany the stir-fry I made (of which half ended up on the floor) and after a couple of glasses it made sense to finish off the vodka from last weekend. It was Andy, too, who suggested just going out for a quiet drink to cap the night off...one turned into four and we stumbled back in - aft...

Last week, the Daily Mail featured a "Hospital Survival Guide". At first glance, I thought this might be the paper's attempt at shrugging off its doomsday, cynical persona and re-inventing itself as the warm, caring periodical - the daily that just wants to look after of you. Then, I read it. The extended title was: "The ingenious tricks that can save you from superbugs and other hospital disasters" and I realised the Daily Mail was not trying to shrug off anything; it was as right-wing as always and just as intent on convincing its readers that New Labour was sneakily trying to kill you and if the psychotic-paedophile-IV drug user doesn't get you, the NHS will. It came as little surprise that its top tips for surviving a trip to hospital were a mix of basic common sense and ludicrous, impracticable scare-mongering. It starts innocuously enough, warning us of the dangers of contracting MRSA and c.difficile. Ok, so far, so obvious. Reading on, we see we are...

For someone so secular, I sure do love those Christian celebrations. Christmas: so spectacular it has its own entire season, and with the presents, carols and novelty-sized Toblerones... what's not to like? Then comes Easter, when we thank God for Green & Blacks. Nestled in between: Easter's hick cousin, Shrove Tuesday. Poor old Shrove Tuesday, only famous for the pancakes. I am not a huge fan of the griddled batter snack per se, but I revel in finally having an excuse to openly spoon Nutella straight from the jar. My lack-lustre approach to both Christianity and pancakes means that Shrove Tuesday usually passes me by - if no money passes hands, well, it just doesn't seem worth it. This year, however, the day when we celebrate pancakes - and Jesus...doing something - has stirred something in me. Or maybe I just ate too much Nutella... Shrove Tuesday also marks the beginning of Lent. I only have one friend who I know rigorously adheres to self-imposed abstinence: wo...

Kidney "failure": there is a clue in there somewhere. From time to time, it feels like the failure of my renal organs has seeped into my bloodstream and slowly morphed me into a big, fat loser; after all, I couldn't even manage to keep my own body parts functioning. What an idiot. Whilst the majority of my friends are a good year into their careers - or at least fully qualified to pursue one - this dumb-ass disease means I haven't been able to keep a job for longer than a year and apparently my sixth-form "Socialite of the Year" award does not rank highly amongst the qualifications most employers look for - ditto Captain of the Cheerleading Squad. My inability to maintain my own health means I am constantly trying to compensate in other ways. At the naissance of my teaching career, I decided I was not going to just be any old, run-of-the-mill teacher, no Sir; I was going to be Teacher of the Year! That was going to be me in an ill-fitting evening gown, r...

In my lame attempt to turn this blog into a mildly amusing and coherent book, I have been forced to spend a considerable amount of time combing back over the events of the last couple of years. In truth, I find reflecting dull and arduous, but if I will insist on trying to write pithy, urbane anecdotes about my current situation, I should really provide some linear explanation as to how I got here in the first place. This is not my first brush with kidney failure. This first bout hit me like a tsunami (too soon? really? even now?) when I was nine and the (mercifully) truncated version is that after eighteen months of dialysis, my mother generously offered up a kidney, which worked wonderfully for ten years. I started dialysis for the second time in January 2008, but the kidney had begun to fail before that. I was chatting with Gerodie Mark the other night about the Durahm Bubble. For those souls who did not attend Durham University, the idea of the Durham Bubble (or "Dubble...