Introduction:

Welcome to my blog which is dedicated to sharing my personal experience in traveling the road from a healthy US Naval Officer to a Home Dialysis patient.

Background: From December 1971 to October 1972, I served In-Country Vietnam as a USN Naval Advisor to South Vietnam’s Brown Water Navy. As such I traveled extensively throughout Central and South Vietnam’s riverine areas where I was subjected to exposure to Agent Orange. Subsequently I developed Type 2 diabetes which I first was able to control with diet and exercise, then oral medication, and finally insulin. This took place over about a thirty-year timeframe. In the early nineties my GP at the time observed that my eGFR (estimated glomerular filtration rate, a measure of how well the kidneys are functioning) was on a downward trend (not good) and passed through the 60-threshold level indicating pending kidney failure. Some 28 years later, my eGFR reached the 6 level, I felt like crap, and suggested to my Renal Specialist Dr Turner that it was time to move on to dialysis to which she agreed. 

On 8/20/22 I started Hemodialysis with Fresenius Granbury, TX which lasted until 9/24/22. On 9/26/22 I started training at Fresenius for PD (Automated Peritoneal Dialysis also known as CCPD, or continuous cycler-assisted Peritoneal Dialysis) and on 9/30/22 accomplished my first at home PD treatment and have been doing so every night since. 

I am an engineer (see www.feeser.net for more details on my background) and as such, have been “engineering” small tweaks and making observations concerning the entire PD process. It is the purpose of this blog to document and pass on to those just starting or already on the same path as I am traveling perhaps to lighten the load for some, to share like experiences with others, and just inform others as to what PD is all about.