The Kidney Stone Adventure: I would compare this pain to...
You know those morning charlie-horse pains that move over your feet and make your muscles tighten and crinkle. You hastily try to readjust your limbs to stop the wave of pain and sometimes you have to endure what feels like years of torture? This muscle-like wave of pain, mixed with little constipation-like stings inside the inner spine is similar to the aching pain of a kidney stone. I can tell you this, because I'm currently passing one - right now - as you read this.
Last Friday morning I woke up in the morning with a bit of an upset stomach. I went to the restroom, drew a hot salt bath and started to feel an accompanying wave of panic join the growing pain when I realized it was not subsiding. The pain was growing in my lower gut and immediately I thought I had a burst or infected ovarian cyst, a regular part of PCOD. However, this pain was a bit different... more severe. It moved in waves and wasn't always constant and after puking and the continued fever, I began to get worried. This wasn't an anxiety attack on steroids, something was 'wrong'.
I called my husband and he rushed home from work, again, on my behalf - and drove me with the kids in tow, to the nearest emergency room. I nearly crawled the sidewalk stretch to the sliding doors and collapsed at the check-in booth. It took three hours of testing to determine what was wrong. No pain meds until they could do a pelvic ultrasound. After the shower-head device had prodded from the inside I then went across the hall for MRI and CAT scans of my abdomen. Blood tests, no STD's, not pregnant, not a cyst, not an appendicitis, what in the heck was wrong?
"Eureka!" The white lab coat gushed through the door with excitement. "You have a big ol' bunch of fat kidney stones!"
I actually felt a waive of relief. Then, I actually felt a waive of relief because they administered pain medications and started to ask me what foods I had eaten that day and when. I was being rolled into emergency surgery. Unfortunately, my white blood cell count was far too high to blast the stones and evict them right away for fear of spreading the infection further so instead I was given a ureter stent, a few weeks worth of antibiotics and the hope for relief sometime in the future.
The 5mm and 9mm stones in my left kidney are still there, blocking the duct to my bladder, but the stent is allowing a very painful occasional run to the restroom and I'm popping pain medications like candy. A terrible night in the hospital, a horrific roommate that puked on the floor and kept screaming at me, the guilt of making my husband leave work early again on behalf of my ill health and the thought of my kids at home with hubby while I was in surgery; I could hardly believe I hadn't had any anxiety attacks.
So, I've worked a few shifts at the new job sense Friday's schedule and I've managed to clean the house, visit friends, cook meals and function somewhat 'normally'. I still find that every single bathroom visit is excruciatingly painful, so I'm praying for just 1 week of meds before I can have the surgery to remove the stent/stones and hopefully not need another stent for healing.
Getting old stinks.
Ever had a kidney stone? What do you think caused it? Advice?
Last Friday morning I woke up in the morning with a bit of an upset stomach. I went to the restroom, drew a hot salt bath and started to feel an accompanying wave of panic join the growing pain when I realized it was not subsiding. The pain was growing in my lower gut and immediately I thought I had a burst or infected ovarian cyst, a regular part of PCOD. However, this pain was a bit different... more severe. It moved in waves and wasn't always constant and after puking and the continued fever, I began to get worried. This wasn't an anxiety attack on steroids, something was 'wrong'.
I called my husband and he rushed home from work, again, on my behalf - and drove me with the kids in tow, to the nearest emergency room. I nearly crawled the sidewalk stretch to the sliding doors and collapsed at the check-in booth. It took three hours of testing to determine what was wrong. No pain meds until they could do a pelvic ultrasound. After the shower-head device had prodded from the inside I then went across the hall for MRI and CAT scans of my abdomen. Blood tests, no STD's, not pregnant, not a cyst, not an appendicitis, what in the heck was wrong?
"Eureka!" The white lab coat gushed through the door with excitement. "You have a big ol' bunch of fat kidney stones!"
I actually felt a waive of relief. Then, I actually felt a waive of relief because they administered pain medications and started to ask me what foods I had eaten that day and when. I was being rolled into emergency surgery. Unfortunately, my white blood cell count was far too high to blast the stones and evict them right away for fear of spreading the infection further so instead I was given a ureter stent, a few weeks worth of antibiotics and the hope for relief sometime in the future.
The 5mm and 9mm stones in my left kidney are still there, blocking the duct to my bladder, but the stent is allowing a very painful occasional run to the restroom and I'm popping pain medications like candy. A terrible night in the hospital, a horrific roommate that puked on the floor and kept screaming at me, the guilt of making my husband leave work early again on behalf of my ill health and the thought of my kids at home with hubby while I was in surgery; I could hardly believe I hadn't had any anxiety attacks.
So, I've worked a few shifts at the new job sense Friday's schedule and I've managed to clean the house, visit friends, cook meals and function somewhat 'normally'. I still find that every single bathroom visit is excruciatingly painful, so I'm praying for just 1 week of meds before I can have the surgery to remove the stent/stones and hopefully not need another stent for healing.
Getting old stinks.
Ever had a kidney stone? What do you think caused it? Advice?
My sister in law got them from calcium supplements...like the kind found in tums...I guess she was easing them like candy while she was pregnant.
ReplyDeleteI've heard that the hormones the body secretes while being pregnant helps the increase of stones - in the gallbladder and kidneys, I've now had BOTH post babies!?
Delete