On Wednesday night I started having really bad back pain. It hurt so bad it was hard to sleep. I went to work the next day and by my break time (11:10am) I was calling the doctor to make an appointment. Luckily they had an appointment that day at 1:45pm. I got off work at 1:00 and went to the doctor. They took a urine sample and there was blood in my urine. My doctor couldn't tell me if it was a kidney infection or...? They had to do a culture on my urine which takes time - and she said she would call me the next day. The nurse called me the next day and said "No kidney infection - doctor wants to send you to the hospital for a CT scan." I was freaked out - what the heck is a CT scan? I quickly googled it and it didn't seem so scary anymore.
James and I were at the hospital at 5:00pm for my CT scan. After checking in, and some paperwork I was finally able to go back to the room. The machine was big and scary the the guy operating it called it a "donut." They took some pictures and then we did some old school x-rays and they sent me on our way.
About 30 minutes later I get a call from the "on call" after hours doctor and he said "You've got a large one on your left side - here is the urologist's number, he can help your further." So I called that guy and he said it was very big. The normal size of a kidney stone is 1-4 mm (that is able to be passed). He said mine is measuring at 11mm! Almost 3x the size of a normal one. He also said I have another small one in there with it. He scheduled my procedure for Monday morning.
Well...now it's Sunday night and I have my procedure tomorrow. I guess it's not really "surgery" because they aren't going to be cutting me open or operating. It's called "lithotripsy" - shock waves that get sent through my back right on my kidney to shatter the stone into tiny little sand pieces. They do have to put me under just because of the shock waves - I hate being put under, but mostly the terrible IV!!! Right before I had Logan they gave me an IV and the nurse was terrible, she couldn't get it in my arm and I was crying because it hurt so bad...anyways, I hope that tomorrow goes better and I will be out of this pain!
I've read that to prevent them you need to drink a lot of water each day - like over a gallon. I'm not sure how I'm supposed to find time to drink that much water while I'm at work. I guess I will have to chug before and after work. Also, drinks like lemonade and orange juice will help because they are acidic.
I'm super nervous and scared and just hope everything goes well! I can't wait to be home tomorrow afternoon snuggling Logan!!!
No comments:
Post a Comment