I'm still...still here.

I'm not sure how many of you still check this site, or how many even actually look at blogs. The last thread I made was completely ignored so I'm not so sure (aside from Volkan). Still, for those of you who may come across this, a little information about what's been going on for the past couple years. And please, I don't want anyone to feel sorry for me, I just thought I'd share a full exposition for once.

As many of you old timer's (Read: long-standing members of the community) are aware, I had a kidney transplant in 2006. For those who are unaware, let me explain. I was born with a hereditary disease known as Alport's Syndrome. This is a disease that mainly affects the kidneys (but also has some indirect effect on hearing as well), what it does is damages the tissue of the kidney which is the part that absorbs and removes dangerous toxins from the bloodstream. In 2005 I was officially "diagnosed" with this, and by diagnosed I mean the disease had finally begun to take effect. The toxin levels were so high that they began affecting my bodies ability to produce white blood cells, and limited my red blood cell count. I was put on a shot that I took every week for about that encourages the bone marrow to produce more white blood cells. During this time I lost most of my energy and the will or interest to do anything (including dungeon siege modding) except continue on for the next shot. I was on that for about 6 months where in March of 2006 my kidneys were pretty much not functioning at all (renal failure). I had an urgent surgery that same week where a catheter was installed into a heart ventricle (at least I'm pretty sure that's where it went).

At that point I was put on dialysis for who would know how long, the waiting list for a kidney is about 2-3 years. Let me just say that Dialysis is NOT fun. You sit in a chair for 4 hours while your blood is pumped out of you, cleaned, and put back in. You can sleep or watch TV, sure, but time definitely seems longer. Side effects of dialysis include nausea, lightheadedness, sleep paralysis, leg/foot cramps that do NOT go away. Some time in the two weeks after my catheter had become infected (I had to get a culture of it, those hurt like a well...you know) and had to be removed, while a temporary catheter was placed in my jugular. They couldn't put a new catheter in on the other side that same day due to a risk of infection spreading. A week later the neck catheter was taken out and one placed in the opposite side of the chest. Keep in mind I was in school at the same time so I had by now lost a month of being able to do homework and things, including weekends (Dialysis is immediately after school ended at 3). Luckily most of my teachers were understanding so I still passed but this caused me to get very lazy.

So I was on dialysis for the summer until August 19th, 2006, just 3 days before school started again, I received a phone call at midnight informing me that there was a cadaver available (a new kidney!) and that I could get the transplant if I came in immediately. I was one of the VERY lucky few who didn't have to wait 2 years for a kidney, thank god for that. Oddly enough the thing I was most worried about while I was in the hospital was my job, I did NOT want to lose it. My boss was understanding but at the same time very disappointed (she didn't have a replacement for while I was gone, not the greatest at preparing for something like this). So I had the transplant and fortunately there were no problems with it and I left the hospital in just 4 days because I recover fast (most people have to wait a week!). I returned to school the day after labor day and attempted to get back to my life, but this is where a lot of the problems started.

I had now missed 3 weeks of school, including 2 classes that were AP, and this meant a LOT of catching up. I eventually came to the decision that in order to pass everything I would have to fail at least one class. English was the furthest behind so I had to let that go (just one semester, I can make it up next year). That didn't make it much easier and it was still very stressful. In fact it got so incredibly difficult to keep up that I ended up quitting my job. That is something I still regret today, regardless of how much of a b**** my boss is to me and her other employees. I had regained most of my energy by this time but the laziness and lack of will from the last several months made me lose interest in pretty much everything. I went from 130 pounds to 180 in just 5 months and by now I weigh 210. I tried hard to get back into things that I enjoy doing (like modding) but nothing ever came to fruition and I gave up. Not to mention that my girlfriend stopped calling me after I had my surgery, I haven't seen her in two years (I heard she dropped out and got herself pregnant by some other guy while we were dating, ugh). I have never told anybody that.

Fortunately things at least went at a reasonable pace the next year, I retook my English semester that I failed and passed with flying colors (I still freaking hate English though). My friend and I have also been writing a book/series of books since the beginning of school 2006, we have a good five-hundred plus pages so far and I'm proud of what we've done. Maybe someday it will get published, have to research that Parody Clause a little bit further though.

Well I graduated last month and needless to say I haven't done shit since. I don't know what I'm going to do with my life and right now I just want to get into college to keep my mind off it. I want to get back into dungeon siege modding, I really do, but my choices over the last two years haven't been that great and my attention span is about the frustrating equivalent of someone attempting to solve a rubik's cube and then throwing it against the wall (Although I can solve a rubik's, heh). I've tried exercising and everything to get my weight back down for the last 3 months, but I haven't been able to lose anything. I haven't exactly been able to gain anything either so I suppose that's good too...not that I'm happy about staying at 210.

I still have my forums at http://shocked18.proboards91.com by the way ;).Anyway I have a new laptop and I'm going to be installing dungeon siege 1 and Legends of Aranna on it and while I'm on vacation this summer maybe, just maybe I'll get bored enough to sit down and work on something. Maybe I'll stick with it, I hope so, I want to complete something big.

Maybe I will this time

By the way, anyone know where I can find an old download of gmax?