It’s My Transplantiversary!

transplantiversary

Or my Kidneyversary? Or something – it’s Number 4!

It has been 4 years since I had my kidney transplant!

Last year was weird with the lockdown and all but this year has been strange in a different way. While we had vaccines that lowered the risk of infection somewhat, we continued to have frequent outbreaks with new variants. Plenty of opportunities for infection…

The fear of catching COVID that was raging last year is down to a bonfire – but for me, I am still pretty nervous! The meds that I take make me immunosuppressed so I am one of those high-risk folks you hear about! And although I am fully vaccinated and boosted, I still spend an inordinate amount of time in the house. The pandemic is still affecting our lives and activities…

For example, I had hoped to be spending this Christmas holiday with my mother-in-law in Mexico but ugh! COVID surges!

With the rapid and overwhelming increase in the omicron variant and the fact that fully vaccinated and boosted folks still have a small chance of catching it…the risk seemed unreasonable for me.

We have rescheduled for spring break – hopefully, there will be a lull in the infection rate by then.

Everyone, stay safe!

Kidney News

At the Blood Lab — ROLL TIDE!

NOTHING! It’s still doing what it’s supposed to so yea!

It’s still nerve-wracking to get my blood drawn—I guess that will always be the case. But so far so good! Water is my friend! I have to drink bottles and bottles and bottles each day.

The Year in Review

A lot of this year revolves around COVID – avoiding infection, finding a vaccine (remember when it was hard to get one?), reading and learning about the virus and its family members, and cleaning, cleaning, cleaning!

So travel this year has been limited – we did go pick up our son from his first year of college in Miami. Unfortunately, we didn’t have the time to just enjoy all that Miami has to offer. hopefully, next year we will be able to go down for a parents’ weekend or something!

Oh, to get back to college, we put him on a plane. LOL

We — my husband and I — also did go to Mexico for a company trip/20-year anniversary celebration in September. The infection rate hadn’t ramped up yet and we decided that we would avoid big groups and eat in our room a lot. It was nice relaxing with each other for a few days.

In Mexico

Oh yeah,  we have been married for 20 years!

Here’s to many more!

Biz News

I still have my blogs:

Rebooted Mom MD

Life: The Reboot

Homestead Living Tips (new)

But I also have some new stuff coming down the pipeline!

I am self-publishing my first fiction novel this year in late March! It’s a romantic suspense novel. I am working on finishing touches — covers, finalizing the title, etc. It is very exciting!

I will have a website — it’s not done so I will share the link and more information about my novel on this blog soon!

I also still have products in my 3 shops — check them out if you are looking for planners, eBooks, calendars, or other printables:

LTRPrintables @ Etsy

Life: The Reboot @ Gumroad

Life: The Reboot @ Amazon

The Next Year: 2022

This year was not as productive as I would have liked for various reasons. But I have a lot planned for next year. Staying healthy and keeping my kidney functioning is only part of it! I appreciate your interest in my story and I will keep you updated on my book plans!

Don’t forget, if you know of anyone looking for a donor or if you are looking for a donor, send me some info and I will post it on my page/blog!

Have a happy and safe holiday season – and a happy New Year!

Love,

Dominique

Transplant Check-In: It’s My Third Anniversary!

Year 3!

 I can’t believe it has been 3 years since my kidney transplant! Three years ago, one of the most important events in my life occurred – one that saved my life.

I always am grateful to my donor but I like to give out a special thanks on our anniversary

During 2020 – that miserable year LOL – we have been fortunate to be healthy and safe as we quarantined. My medications haven’t changed this year and my kidney function has remained stable. Blood sugar is borderline but I have to be more aggressive about my workout regimen. Lose a little weight – I started before the pandemic but those quarantine baking sessions took their toll!

She is repping for the Steelers right now but still says the Packers are her favorite football team!

My son has finished the first semester of college and my daughter has started high school online.  That is less than optimal as she has special needs but hopefully next year she will be able to attend in person.

My husband is quarantining with me and working from home. He can’t wait until we can travel again. We look forward to seeing J in Miami one day. I mean next year, Alabama and Miami pay each other in football! It’s a mini-civil war in the Brooks household!

ROLL TIDE!

For Goals for 2021:

  • Improve my fitness plan and lose 10 lbs
  • Continue to improve my Etsy Store – did I tell you I have an Etsy Store now? https://www.etsy.com/shop/LTRPrintables
  • Continue to publish my blogs and better monetize them
  • Do a better job posting on Wanted: A Kidney for Nikki
  • I sent my first novel to be edited so I want to have it published in 2021
  • Start novel number 2
  • Launch a few mini-courses (self-help) through my websites
  • Spend time with my family and hopefully travel again
  • Protect my kidney!

I hope you all have been having a safe and healthy year. Again, if you know of someone looking for a donor or if you are looking for a donor, send me some info and I will post it on my page/blog!

Have a Happy Holiday and a Happy New Year!

Love,

Dominique

Check-In: Two Years In…My Transplantiversary!

2 year transplantiversary cake

Two years ago on December 26, 2017, I received the greatest gift from my wonderful donor.

transplant hero donor

It’s been 2 years — my transplantiversary– it’s hard to believe because time flies so quickly now.

Things are settling out a bit.

  • My kidney seems to be trucking along fine. I work hard to stay hydrated — I have become a big fan of HINT water.
  • My calcium levels had been borderline high. One of the side effects of kidney disease is that it throws your parathyroid out of wack. There are medications you can take for that. When you have a transplant, the parathyroid may come back or not. My levels have remained borderline so I started taking a small dose of that medication. So far so good.
  • My hemoglobin A1C has been borderline as well. I lost 15 pounds during the summer to try to manage that. We will see how that goes. The antirejection meds while amazing are often unkind to the pancreas. I will be working on that.

Family Update

  • Thomas and I went to Grand Cayman this summer. It is such a beautiful island. It is so wonderful to be able to travel without lugging my dialysis machine around with me.
Cyaman Islands trip
  • This summer after the picture above, I lost a lot of my extra weight on the Optavia program which I am going to put Kendall on a modified version of during the holidays (after Christmas dinner!). I am going to do it with her — it’s a gentle keto-like program where you eat multiple small meals/snacks a day and one or two healthy portion-controlled meals. She has gained weight so far this school year, and with her leg problems, we have to nip that in the bud early.
  • She’s also going to high school next year. I can’t believe it!
  • Joshua has finished his applications for college — just waiting for responses. We are working on scholarships now. I can’t believe he’s leaving already!
  • Thomas and I are planning for a family graduation trip next summer. More details later.
  • My father has had a rough go of it over the last few months. But over the past week, his doctors have managed to make him feel better but now we have more tests to see why he is not feeling well.
family photo 2019
Brooks Family Christmas 2019

Transplantiversary Celebration

Unlike last year, I am going to actually celebrate my 2-year transplantiversary. I had a cake made! I have one question: Why is the kidney so small? Ha Ha!

My cake in the shop. Why is the kidney so small? LOL

We are going to a friend’s house for brunch on the 26th (without J — he’s playing basketball in another city). He reminded me of the fact that he won’t be around for several days after Christmas so some of my leftover Christmas meal may go to waste!

On to year 3! It’s going to be an exciting year! I have plans! LOL

Other Happenings

2020 planners
  • I have been working on my novel — I was getting it edited but hit some snags. I will get that finished within the first six months of 2020.

Thank you for continuing to share my posts and my Facebook page to help spread the word about other people who are looking for their angels. Let’s keep spreading stories for others who are in the same spot I was.

I am going to have a happy transplantiversary! Thank you for reading and have a beautiful day!

thank you!
Thank you for your support!

Be Inspired–Give Life!

Dominique

Check-In: 18 Months Later

chairs with a beach view

Hi! I just wanted to post a quick update on me and my kidney!

The water is so peaceful…

Note: I published this on my blog yesterday but it did not get to my Facebook page. So I am publishing again…

It’s been two months since my last post.

I am walking more so that is finally getting back on track. For the first time in my life, I am actually counting calories! It is totally confusing. I spent my life (up until my kidneys gave out) eating at will. I typically tried to eat healthier as I got older but calories were never an issue. So counting them? Weird…LOL

My father is getting stronger since the surgery. But we have had to start to bring in an aide a few times a week to help him. Over the next 2 months, we will have to increase both the time and the number of days because my son is looking at colleges. We have a few trips planned to help him make some decisions. He’s a senior now and where did the time go?

Beautiful, isn’t it?

Finally, my husband and I went to Grand Cayman earlier this month. That is a wonderful place — perfect for relaxing on the beach or by the pool It’s not really a party place but there were a lot of things to do. I am going to publish a post on my blog (Tales of Rebooted Mom MD — which will launch in a bit) about our stay soon!

Remember to check the Wanted: A Kidney For Nikki Facebook page. I am regularly sharing posts about other people looking for a kidney. Please share!

Examples of New Journals in My Store…

Also, check out Life: The Reboot and My Amazon Author Page. I post once or twice a week to Life: The Reboot — all about self-improvement. There are also numerous journals for sale on my author page — check them out!

Have a wonderful day!

Be Inspired –Give Life!

Dominique

16 Months In…

It has been a few months since I have published anything on this blog. However, I have been publishing links to other people who are looking for a donor on my Facebook page. Have you been checking them out?

Thanks to everyone who has been sharing those posts! You never know who might see one of these posts! Beautiful things can happen!

On the home front, It has been 16 months since my transplant!

Things are settling down a bit with my medications after last summer. When my mother passed, my immune system was completely out of whack! Things straightened themselves out but over the past complete of weeks, my anti-rejection med level had dropped. My stomach would get upset and that was affecting my labs. It seems that after a lifetime of loving all things cheese that I have finally become semi-lactose intolerant!

No more queso or multiple slices of pizza! I can still eat yogurt and small amounts of pizza and other dairy products. But this will bring about a huge change in my diet and how I eat. Probably not a bad thing though.

Also, I haven’t been completely successful with my fitness plans and plan to start again in May. Life kept getting in the way. Like my father had surgery last month and the recovery has been slow. He was in the rehab hospital for a while and we are now trying to get back to a schedule. We will have some help too. I am sure many of you understand that as well!

Donate Life Month

The month of April has been Donate Life Month with a lot of publicity and several events to highlight awareness about organ donation.

Aren’t these lovely? Even though April is almost over, please share!

Other News…

I still have my blog: Life: The Reboot but I am starting a couple of new ventures. One is a new blog: Tales of the Rebooted Realigned Mom MD. When I started Life: The Reboot, I wanted to talk about my life — Health, Travel, Food, Fitness. I am a physician and I had planned to talk about health issues too. But I ended up focusing more on self-help. So I am going to keep that going on that blog but the new blog is going to be closer to my first vision. I also want to utilize Facebook Live and Instagram stories — I want my readers to know me!

I will let you know when my new blog goes live!

I still have journals and planners published on Amazon — please check them out!

This is a sample of some of the journals/planners on my Amazon page.

I am also going to try to publish on the blog more often!

Stay tuned and have a wonderful day!

Dominique

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