Dialysis 3: Warm Enough

Dialysis 3: Warm Enough

November 3rd, 2022 | General, Health

Many people struggle to stay warm. They flee to Florida and Arizona, to Spain, pretty much anywhere the summer springs eternal. When they cannot do that, they jack up the thermostat. When my sister returned to Massachusetts on break from Arizona State University,...
Dialysis 2: How Can I Screw Up?

Dialysis 2: How Can I Screw Up?

September 12th, 2022 | Family, General, Health

Honestly, qualified medical professionals and the Fresenius Medical Care/NxStage Medical, Inc. have extraordinary faith that someone like me is not going to precipitate a medical crisis. I’m a full partner in this home hemo thing. I received six weeks of...
Other Hidden Histories

Other Hidden Histories

August 5th, 2022 | Family, Genealogy, General, Health, Memory

Sometimes a book seems like it was written just for you. A review of Hidden Valley Road: Inside the Mind of an American Family (2020) by Robert Kolker caught my eye. Perhaps it was in The New York Times, maybe The New Yorker magazine. The book seemed like something my...
Dialysis 1: Home Sweet Hemo

Dialysis 1: Home Sweet Hemo

May 20th, 2022 | Family, General, Health, Home Improvements

It once seemed inconceivable that we—or anyone–would operate a dialysis center in a spare bedroom. If a medical treatment must consume most of your attention and half your week, then bringing it home makes a certain amount of sense. When the Kidneys Give Out For...
Dying For What One Believes?

Dying For What One Believes?

September 20th, 2021 | General, Health, Politics, social media

It is Sunday, July 19, 2021, as I write. I read the COVID statistics published in The Baltimore Sun every day, have been since they began printing that little gray box in the paper. I noticed today, with shock, that the death toll had jumped by four in Harford County,...