Dr's Follow up visit

We had our follow up visit yesterday with both our family dr and the kidney specialist.  The family dr went well, he did another blood panel and told us to just keep doing what we are doing and come back in 6 weeks,, (WHEW we have time to save some money for gas now!)

 The Kidney specialist went well also, considering.  He is still worried about the swelling, which has gone down drastically, and needs to continue to go down. Dr Leon, (the kidney dr) finally gave us a name for what we are going through.  Renal Cardiovascular Disease, which leads to kidney failure, which we are full steam ahead on that one, and heart failure.  By getting rid of the excess fluid we are treating the heart but killing the kidneys, so a transplant is inevitable in no later than 3 years, to get on the list that is and start dialysis.

Dr L had us see his nutritionist because Todd is VERY anemic, which also explains his desire/need to sleep almost all the live long day, and his protein is dangerously low.  So we,, YES WE, are on a strict diet.  I prefer to call it a lifestyle change.  NO more than 1500 mg of sodium a day.  I challenge you to look at your food labels and read exactly how much sodium is in the food you are eating,, it's kinda gross.  Just in my yoplait light that I had for breakfast there is 80 mg.  Todd can only have certain veggies, tons of red meat,, yay for him, his favorite food, and chicken.  We are doing this together because, well, there is strength in numbers.  We aren't allowed dairy, cheese, corn, and a bunch of other stuff that is common every day foods, I really have to look over all the info the nutritionist gave us yesterday.  (yes I know I ate a yogurt for breakfast, Im not throwing them out!)

While we are in with the nutritionist, Dr L had a nurse come take a small sample of blood to run for iron and protein levels and came back asking what insurance we had,  (YAY MACY"S)  Unfortunately, our insurance does not cover a shot he needs, when I asked how much the shot was I dang near fell off my chair,, (no Jen, I don't remember what it was! a hormone of some sort to get his protein levels up I believe) $800 for ONE SHOT!  So we are upping the anti on his protein, he is taking liquid protein and filling up on egg whites and meat.

On that note,  Dr L left us saying come back in 2 months, and try to up our insurance (it's already taking half my paycheck every week :-/)

All I can say is anyone out there reading this who has diabetes and thinks, 'pft, I'm fine, nothing will happen, oh please it's all just a scare tactic' PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE look after yourself,, keep your blood sugars under control, watch your diet.  It can and it WILL happen to you, and this is NOT something I would wish on my worst enemy!! (if I had one)

So I am off to work leaving Todd alone for the first time in two week, and there is a huge pit in my stomach.
Keep us in your prayers please.  <3