Despite Illness, Optimist Enjoys Wonderful Life

The snakelike vein meandering up Richard Dulebohn’s right forearm fascinates him.

It’s purplish and pulls his skin a half-inch above the rest of his arm. If he presses his finger lightly on the right curve, he can feel the buzz from a whirlpool of blood rushing there from opposite directions.

He’s so pleased at the discovery that he sits a moment in silent appreciation. He’s done a lot of that since his kidney shut down five years ago.

“Life couldn’t be better,” he says, pulling his shirt sleeve over the fragile vein through which dialysis machines pump his blood. “I have more than I’ve ever had, and I’m in a better place than I’ve ever been.”

Renal disease is killing Richard, despite the best efforts of dialysis. But he’s never been more content or more in tune with the world.

“I had drive all my life,” he says. “Now I have direction.”

Richard, who’s 78, was prepared to live forever when he retired with his wife, Mary, to the Shoshone County woods in 1981. He was an architect and engineer longing to live in jeans and sneakers and remodel old cabins.

The pine-scented air along the north fork of the Coeur d’Alene River was good for the Dulebohns. Richard’s gray hair grew long enough to braid and his beard grew thick. He and Mary ate from their organic garden and shunned meat.

They walked daily and read in the evenings. He remodeled a cabin to house them, then transformed an old school into a cabin.

During the winters, Richard shoveled a quarter-mile long path every day from their cabin to their car parked on the road. They drove to Coeur d’Alene several times a week for pottery and watercolor lessons.

Life stayed busy until Richard’s energy suddenly diminished in 1992. He sat most of that summer watching weeds grow around their cabin. Mary knew they had to move before winter.

The home they found in Post Falls sat midway between two of their favorite square dance halls. Richard figured his malaise would pass and they could dance again. But four days after the move, biting back pains sent him flying to a doctor who dispatched him to the hospital.

He was flown to Spokane’s Sacred Heart Medical Center with an aneurysm in his aorta. Doctors stopped every function in Richard’s body for 20 minutes while they snipped out the 3-inch flaw and replaced it with Dacron.

Everything returned to work after the surgery except his kidneys. Without kidneys, toxins build up in the body and lead quickly to death. Richard started dialysis immediately.

For a year, he stewed. He was tethered to a dialysis machine 12 hours a week. His body’s resulting need for extra protein forced meat back into his diet. He was weak and drowning in medical bills because, years earlier, he had opted out of extra Medicare coverage.

“I thought: ‘Why did they do this to me? I had a little pain. I died. Why didn’t they let me go?”’

As Richard strengthened, his bitterness ebbed and hope returned. He read about natural ways to prepare his body to help itself. He drank mushroom tea with ginseng. Mary massaged him, and he bathed in herbal water. They started weight workouts three times a week.

His body, rather than his mind, controlled everything he did for the first time in his life, which intrigued him. He believed life was more than a biological process, but he wanted to know for sure.

So, he began searching for the reason he exists.

Richard read and contemplated theories on human purpose and spirit. He pondered ideas new to him and discovered senses he’d never acknowledged. His focus on life sharpened and he expanded the ages-old boundaries he’d set on himself.

“Life is an opportunity for the mind and the spirit to experience things,” he says as he watches a sparrow nurse at the bird feeder he fills every day. “I am in a different place now, and my life is better than it’s ever been.”

Dialysis continues three times a week, but Richard considers it a wonder, not a chore. His kidneys still don’t work, but he refuses to worry about things out of his control. Instead, he thanks his kidneys for leading him to a better life.

“In my space everything is perfect,” he says.

“Not too hot or too cold, but just right.”

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo