In the PACU

Storm is in the recovery room and already awake....his doctor, whom I have never met, called me on the phone and said everything went well. He told me nothing more and that was sort of a bummer. "Everything went well" is not a lot to go on, but I am thankful that there were no difficulties. I am supposed to check with the little lady in a pink coat in 90 minutes to see if Storm has been transferred to a room....6 west apparently. Waiting is not easy. Dick & Donna Carl are here with me and Vera (Kevin's wife). Dick brought along his notebook (laptop) and I am sitting here in the surgical waiting area writing this wirelessly....how cool is that?? Maybe Dick has some cool photos in his files?!?!? Do I dare even look? :)

So far so good. I will write more as the information comes in. I love technology, it is so great to hear from everybody and be able to get the information to you. As always, thanks for the support!!More in a few hours.

Kevin has about two more hours of surgery to go, but all is well at this time. Love, KM

In the OR

Well, today has been interesting to say the least. As one would expect Storm and I did not sleep that well last night. I was up at 0300 and that was the end of that. We left the hotel at 0445 and walked over to the med center only to find out that the first two entrances we tried were locked....but they want everyone there by 0500. (Storm called in yesterday and was told he was slated for a 0630 surgery.) Made it to admissions where they had no idea who Kevin and/or Storm were or why they would be there....lost the paper work. This might be shocking if it did not happen 98% of the time. If you are ever asked to do a "pre-admission" for a hospital, don't bother (especially if you are flying in from Anchorage), it is a complete waste of every one's time!!! So while "they" are trying to recreate the wheel, an admissions clerk tells me that I have to put away my camera because I might be a terrorist. I am NOT making this up. Do you think for one second that if I even slightly resembled a mid-easterner that she would have said that to me? Not a chance!!! She told me that I could be plotting to place a package by taking pictures of the lobby. Honestly, she just could have said it was for pt. privacy, but terrorism? Anyhoo....so we are in pre-op and the nurse tells us that Storm's surg is not until 0830 and then as the recipient....Wait a second!!! Eight-thirty?? Recipient??? Try again. The confidence was a little shaken. BUT we got it straightened out and everyone else we met seemed very cool, competent and most importantly; sober. Storm is in surgery right now, I expect to get an update in about two hours. Kevin goes in around 0830. Thanks again for every one's good thoughts, prayers, cards and Karma....whatever it takes; you all have been very empowering and we cannot tell you how much that means to both of us. I'll get back to you all as soon as I can. Love, Kerry

Here is a lovely file picture for you. Storm has no family pictures on his lap top yet and since I was unable to document the days events, you will have to meditate over these peaceful flowers.

Tomorrow!

Hello Everyone, we are here in the hotel room at 2200 on Tuesday. I am scheduled to arrive in the OR tomorrow morning at 0630. Its about a 3+ hour surgery so you should start looking for updates in the early afternoon tomorrow Pacific time.
Today has been pretty boring, when you can't eat you realize how much of our lives revolve around eating. So I'm starving and 'cleansing' my bowels thanks to some really nasty tasting drinks. So its been a less than enjoyable evening but not too bad overall I guess. Wish me luck and I'll be in touch soon. I'll write you an update once I'm out of the hospital on Thursday, KM will keep you updated in the meantime. Take Care, Storm

Hello everybody. KM and I are in LA. It was an uneventful flight down here, although KM had to sit next to some dude that kept picking wax out of his ear and looking at it. For a minute I thought that she was going to kick his ass, but luckily for him he went to sleep and the crisis was averted. I am about to pass out from starvation so you'll have to excuse any typos. This clear liquid diet stuff blows, I don't know how I'll make it through tomorrow, and there is no doubt that I'll feel terrible after the surgery since I won't have eaten in almost 3 days. Anyhow, no pics tonight but we'll keep doing small posts to let everyone know what's happening. Right before we left AK our email stopped working so I apologize if we've missed any msgs lately. "They" at customer support claim that it is fixed now but I have my doubts. We'll know in the morning I guess. I'm afraid that a bunch of msgs will be lost in cyberspace without us ever seeing them... nothing is ever easy. That's about it, the boys are happy and healthy with Grammy and we are sitting around LA not eating. Talk to you again soon. Storm

So it begins....

Good Morning....are you enjoying a clear liquid breakfast? A little jello, Gatorade, water perhaps? That is what Storm is on until Wed evening. No chewing food until Wed night....honestly, I do not think I could do this....and I am not sure I can do this with Storm either. Have any of you ever been around him when he hasn't eaten?!?!? It is not pretty. Luckily for us we have great friends and over the past two nights we have been fed well! Thank you Steve and Jamie, and Mike and Sue. The picture was taken last night (tonight still for me) at the "Kidney Party"....dig the shirts? The kidney shaped, red velvet cake that Sue made said "Here's looking at you Kid (ney)!" :) We had kidney bean races with the kids, kidney beans in the salad....thought about chili, but I thought the plane ride would be painful at best, so we skipped the chili and went straight for the KING crab! Gotta love Alaska. SO, I have got a ton to do....we are off to LA at 10:00am and am I packed? Have I cleaned the kitchen counters? Does anyone want to risk their lives and check out the master bathroom? I don't want to either. Thanks again for all the support, kind words, good thoughts and prayers. All are greatly appreciated. Please stayed tuned for up coming events. Do you want the blistering details of the Go-lightly day? Well, you think it is bad for you...I have to share a hotel room with him!!! :) Thanks again. I will be in touch. Much Love, Kerry (KM) P.S. We do have the kidneys on the back of the shirts, but it does not make for a great picture....

School Pics

The kids got their school pics today so here they are for all to see. All the effort that day got KM a front page picture and article so its only fitting that the kids photos turned out pretty well too. I also put in the pics of Nick and Alex on their summer soccer teams. With any luck this blog will come out better than the last as far as word and picture placement. I put it all how I wanted it, I previewed it and it looked great, then you post it and its all jacked up. Sometimes you just can't win.

After this the kids are off to bed and then I get to read about being a cubscout den leader, because I felt that our lives just weren't quite busy enough.

5 more days until I lose an organ! See Ya, Storm

Getting Closer

Hi, wanted a few more pics on here but I was foiled by the system. So you get pics of Max and Alex at the Nature center and a pic of Dad and Nick on 'walk to school day'.

Hello Again, well next week at this time I will only have one kidney, and with any luck everything else on me will still work normally. It will be a relief to have it over that is for sure.

Things here are spiraling out of control as usual. On Saturday we went to the ski swap and got boots and skis for all the kids and for KM, I did manage to suppress the urge to buy a snowmobile this year but it was really close. So now we are set, we just need some snow. The kids are very excited about skiing again this year so it should be a lot of fun. Who ever thought I would be looking forward to hanging out on the bunny hill all day. Although at the rate the kids seem to pick things up we won't be on the Bunny Hill for long. I am personally all set-up to do some back country skiing this year, the only things that I still need are an avalanche beacon and to take a 3 day avalanche class to learn about snow packs and what is dangerous and what isn't. I think that an avalanche would take all the fun out of the ski day experience so I'm taking all the precautions.

Today was National walk-to-school day so this morning we asked Nick if he wanted to walk to school, he looked at us like we had 3 heads and barely concealing his belief that both his parents had lost their marbles asked 'why?' . We did in fact walk to school, its only a mile and its all downhill, of course we saw exactly NO ONE else doing the same thing, so much for 'walk-to-school' day.

The boys are excited about Halloween and Max has been wearing his costume around for the past 3 days. He is going to be a beetle/bug I'll attach pictures soon.

We have about 100 things that need to be done before we go, yet everything we do takes 5 times longer than it should for whatever reason. Of course the only time that we have to be really productive is after the kids go to bed and then we are too exhausted to actually get going on any of the projects. I guess that's why we only 'blog' once a week or so. I think that we will catch up sometime after all the boys are in school.

I think that is about it, the rains have stopped for a few days and the weather is awesome, clear and crisp with a lot of color. The leaves are coming off pretty fast though so winter is just around the corner. Thank you to everyone who has called to offer their support, be that physical or emotional. I really appreciate everyone keeping me in their thoughts and we'll do our best to keep you all updated. That's it for a few days, or at least until something exciting happens around here. Take Care, Storm