Mabuti na ang handa

I ALMOST called it a life last week were it not for a sudden change of heart and a decision to get admitted into a hospital.

After taking a bath in the afternoon of Friday, I was shocked to discover that my shorts didn’t fit. I thought I brought a wrong one to the shower and so I went to the room draped in a towel.

But lo and behold, none of my shorts fit and I was alarmed. The only shorts I could wear were basketball shorts.

I had bloated to unproportional and alarming size. In fact, I couldn’t put on my artificial leg!

My kidney had really failed! And I could die!

At about 5:45 p.m., I told my wife that we should go to church or the 6 p.m. mass and then proceed to the hospital.

She told me that there was no time to waste and we should go straight to the hospital.

Unfortunately, there were no rooms available at the moment at Capitol Medical Center and I had to be attended at the emergency section. I was finally transferred to a room on the 6th floor at 5 in the morning.

After a series of tests, my doctor entered and told me I needed dialysis.

I refused at first saying that I did not want to be a hostage to the machine for the rest of my life. I’d rather die now than prolong the suffering. I only needed medicine.

He told me that the decision was up to me. He even said that if he had a choice, he wouldn’t want to go through dialysis himself.

But just for emergency purposes, I have to be ready for the treatment. Kailangan na raw butasan ang leeg ko because I might eventually want dialysis. Mabuti na ‘yung handa.

You may want to go through it once, twice, thrice and then quit. There’s no harm in trying.

And so I agreed and signed a consent letter.

Lo and behold late that Saturday afternoon, I was taken to the operating room and a hole was drilled into my neck. Immediately afterwards, I was taken to the dialysis room for six hours initial treatment that lasted until 2 in the morning.

It wasn’t bad. It was not painful. I just watched three movies on television through it all.

And now my life depends on that machine forever until I can get a kidney transplant.

First things first though. The hole in the neck is temporary and a hole in the arm is needed, and that is quite expensive. Pag-iipunan ko pa muna.

This disease is expensive. And I don’t know if it is worth continuing the treatment until the bank account runs out. It might be better to let go and leave whatever is in the account to my youngest daughter who is about to enter college.

Maybe that would be the better alternative. After all I’ve been there, done that, and experienced everything there is to experience. There is no point in prolonging the agony.
I can call it a life.