I find it amazing that I can go from complete confidence to nothing, absolute excitement and belief in myself to …..nothing.
Two of my favourite people told me not to be so hard on myself. Hasn’t a life of being hard on myself developed the strong Wonder Woman everyone sees?
Yesterday I inserted both of my cannulas (needles) into my fistula, they flushed well with normal saline and everything seemed to be okay but then the machine kept alarming, saying that the limits for the arterial line were too high, and they were. We moved the needle a little, taped it a different way and it still kept alarming.
My smile turned to a frown.
Was I being too cocky, thinking I had this needle thing ‘in the bag’? I just felt like I could do it. I felt I knew what I was doing, I felt for my fistula before placement and presumed I was placing the needle in correctly. I just felt like crying. My biggest worry was losing all the confidence I had and not being able to insert the needles anymore. I don’t know where I will be tomorrow and I hope I am not hesitant when inserting the needle. I know I can do it, we all make mistakes, I haven’t been doing this long enough to be an expert but I am still doubting myself.
Doubt in yourself is easier than pride but I should be proud, after only 4 days I was inserting my own needles. I made a mistake after three days and my mistake wasn’t huge, it would seem that the needle was just running a little bit close to the wall of my fistula and that is why it kept alarming.
The nurse reinserted my needle and it was running smoothly.
I am no professional, well not yet anyway, I just have to have more practice, I have never done this before.
Kidney failure, dialysis, inserting needles into fistulas, being hooked up to an artificial kidney for hours at a time is all new to me. There is a lot I have to get used to, doing my very best and trying as hard as I can is all I can do. Believing in myself and the fact that I will soon be able to come home and do my dialysis at home is what I am holding onto. I will still be sick, still have kidney failure but at least being at home will be easier than traveling to the hospital all of the time. It won’t be the life we envisioned but at least we will be able to make a life outside of traveling to the hospital every second day.
