Hey Guys,

I just released a new blog post, Low Blood Pressure, Shock, and the First Adult Doctor. For years I struggled with low blood pressure and a high heart rate. This always ended with me in the hospital with hypovolemic shock.

Then the year I turned eighteen something crazy happened. My always-too-low blood pressure shot up into the 190s/120s. A normal mom might have taken me to the ER for that, but my mom of course chalked it up to anxiety and not tolerating enough tube feed. It didn't explain the white hot stabbing pain in my head.

When I went to see Dr. Kaye and her nurse Jen took my blood pressure, she was quite alarmed. After I explained it had been like that for weeks and talked her out of sending me to the ER, she finally spoke

"Blood pressure is regulated by the kidneys. Any time a patient has an issue with high blood pressure we refer them to a nephrologist, a kidney doctor," Dr. Kaye explained. "I'm going to refer you to an adult nephrologist since you're eighteen now and transitioning to adult care. Your headaches are a result of your blood pressure being at critical high levels."

Her comment about transitioning to adult care really had me bugging. I wasn't ready to be an adult. I have a developmental delay. Inside I'm only eight. How could they throw me in with the adult wolves? I was going to be eaten alive. The adult floors had no playrooms or teen activity rooms, they had no child life therapists coming around with art projects and DVDs to watch or video games to play. They wouldn't give me stuffed animals when I felt lonely.

What I also didn't realize was, in adult medical care, the patient gets listened to first and the parents second. If what the child says differs from what the parent says they do some investigating instead of automatically accepting the parent's words over the child's. Hmm, maybe adult medical care wouldn't be so bad for me I thought to myself as Dr. Green cut off my mom.

"Well that's an interesting theory, but that's not what these scans are showing me, and scans don't lie."

I just smiled to myself and exhaled a little bit.

I could get used to this.