Still Here

Well, I survived the stent surgery. I'm still pretty sore so I'm taking another day off work to heal up a bit more before driving much and sitting upright in a chair for hours on end.

One of the balloons burst and partially deployed the stent during the procedure (which then got stuck in the blood vessel in the wrong spot) so they had to go into another artery in my left leg and pull it out from the opposite direction. Apparently this second incision was a bit more invasive than the one in my right leg so it's extremely sore and turning a nice purplish color as it bruises up. Because of that the procedure took about 3½ hours instead of the usual 1 hour or so. I'm on blood thinners to keep the stents from forming clots so later that evening when I was finally allowed to stand up, one of the incision spots started bleeding and I got to spend the night flat on my back trying not to move my legs much, and having vitals taken every 1-2 hours.

Other than that though, everything went well. I'm scheduled for a quick follow-up visit next week and then another in 2-3 weeks. Hopefully the stents will make as big a difference as they're thinking and I can lower some of the meds I'm taking. But even if that doesn't happen, my kidneys are at least getting normal blood flow again and I'm not in danger of going into kidney failure without warning. So all this fun has been worth it.