what a saga

so paul and mairead know more than they ever wanted to know about my urinary tract.

I went to urgent care twice last week with UTI symptoms, and took two different kinds of antibiotics with marginal relief. Monday morning I woke up at 2:45am with this seriously awful pain in my back and left side. I kept peeing and trying to go back to sleep unsuccessfully until 6am when I called my mom freaking out. urgent care opened at seven and mairead and I were sitting in the parking lot as the dude opened the door.

saw the doctor. he punched me in the back and said he thought I had a kidney infection and needed iv antibiotics that they didn’t have at urgent care so I needed to go to the emergency room.

mairead and I got to the emergency room at good sam hospital at 9am. there was only one person in the waiting room. we lucked out (apparently later the waiting room was overflowing. booyah) and I got into a bed relatively quickly. the er doctor took some urine and blood samples and examined me and said she wanted to make sure it wasn’t kidney stones before she treated me for a non-existant infection so I got a cat scan.

that was new, never had a cat scan before. it was pretty easy. all I had to do was not breathe at points. fortunately before the cat scan they gave me pain and nausea medication so I could actually hold still for the scan cause otherwise I would have been all folded up and squirmy and I’m sure they wouldn’t have gotten a good picture. yeah. the cat scan showed a 4mm stone in my ureter. wooo. ow.

apparently there was a 50% chance I’d pass it but the urologist was extremely doubtful and I didn’t want to experience that pain again so when they said I should probably just having it taken out I said yes immediately. this meant I had to stay the night in the hospital, another new experience. I finally got out of the emergency room at 3pm, so mairead and I could hang in a real room and not one full of screaming sick people. we also made a million phone calls, mostly to my mom (who was/is totally torn up that she’s not here).

my nurse the first day was in marching band in college (flag) so we bonded when she saw my MI tshirt. I had a nice view of western cincinnati, and a bunch of visitors. Sue, the executive director of MNM came by, as did Sr Sally, Srs Ann and Mary Ann (Mairead’s boss and her bff), Sr Carren, and Paul, of course. Mairead ran home and got me a book and my contact solution. the urologist didn’t come by until after 7, but when he did he was really informative and helpful and used visual aids to explain what exactly was going on and what he’d do to fix it. he answered all our questions.

Paul and Mairead left at 8pm cause that’s when visiting hours end, and at 8:30 they filled the other bed in my room which was disappointing cause I didn’t want to share and cause she was in a lot of pain and would wake up periodically and yell for more meds and she slept with the tv on. I mean, I got some sleep cause I’d been awake since 3am basically but not great sleep. the night nurse was not as good, cause she didn’t offer me a snack and she didn’t introduce herself to me until it was too late for me to snack and then just cause she had to check my vitals but she did do a really good job of fixing my iv when I woke up in the morning and my arm was really sore. which is the important thing. sleeping with an iv sucks.

she woke me up at 6 so I’d be all ready when the dude came to get me at 6:35. I was worried cause Mairead and Paul weren’t there yet and they wouldn’t know where to go but I had to sign consent papers before they took me downstairs and there was just enough of a delay that Mairead got there just in time to walk me to surgery.

TMI: they made me take a pregnancy test in the middle of the surgery prep room but had to use a catheter cause I was nervous.

the or nurse was really nice. I was talking to her and the anesthesiologist right before surgery and he asked if I had any allergies and I said latex and they asked me what happens when I’m in contact and I said it depends on the length and type of exposure. she asked me if I could eat bananas and I said nope I get really bad stomach pains and she said whoa, you do have a latex allergy! and then made sure that there was no latex anywhere. I didn’t even wear the cap over my hair because she was worried about the latex in the elastic band. so I felt like I was in good hands.

I got on the table at 7:30. and then I woke up at 10 back in the surgery prep room. mairead said the urologist said that it went well but the stone was smaller than they thought so he wanted an xray to make sure they got it all out (I think he told me this too but I was still a bit out of it so I’m glad Mairead remembered and took charge). he also explained to her all the drugs he’d give me and when my follow up visit would be. she made me an appointment with his office for next week to get the stint taken out.

Paul, Mairead, and I waited and waited until 1pm for the xray, which took maybe 15 minutes. my nurse that day was nice, but basically non-existent. she was just never around and they didn’t bring me lunch and then they couldn’t find my chart to take me to xray and no one knew where she was to ask her so they had to radio her. Mairead saw her in the break room a lot. and she didn’t tell me what not to do when I was on drugs but Kayla did so it’s ok. I was finally discharged sometime after 3 and we got home at 4.

Paul drove me home and wouldn’t let me carry anything. Mairead went to fill my prescriptions but there was a problem with my insurance so she had to come home to get my card and I had to call Anthem and tell them what was up and they fixed it so I got my pills. and Mairead picked me up some yogurt so I could get some bacteria going.

I’m not supposed to go back to work until Friday. probably a good thing considering I’m actually forced to take my pain medication cause my kidney still hurts and I can feel the stint and it doesn’t feel good. but, it doesn’t hurt half as bad as the stupid stone did and I’m getting all this crap that was backed up into my kidney out of my system. so I’m spending today (and tomorrow) in bed or on the couch drinking ribena and popping pills.

Mairead and Paul are relieved that I’m home and they don’t have to hang out in hospitals anymore.