As if the bum ovaries weren't enough, now I've got these stone-throwing kidneys

In the wee hours of Saturday morning, two-thirty to be precise, I got up to pee because I drink a lot of water and have a bladder the size of an acorn. At two-fifty-seven, I had a sensation that I can only describe as an explosive and searing pain that felt like someone had planted a tiny bomb directly in my left kidney. I was a bit confused because I didn't see any bleeding or shrapnel, but I was a little too busy screaming in pain to ponder it further.

By three-thirty, Ryan had decided that he'd had enough of my wailing and I was going to the hospital, like it or not, so he went to go get our car. The battery was, of course, dead. We arrived at the hospital at four in the morning, after a car ride where Ryan hit all three million potholes in Detroit and I threw up into not one but TWO old fast food bags in our backseat.

In triage at the hospital, the nurse kept asking me to sit still instead of pacing or pedaling my legs so that she could get better measurements. I kept asking her if she wanted to vomit on her like I did a little bit on Ryan's leg in the car. She said no, and so I kept pacing to help reduce the pain a bit. Then she snidely said that if I have a kidney stone, I'm getting a taste of what it'll be like to have a baby. I roared back that I was never going to have a baby, then, and if I got pregnant I would HOLD IT IN. This entire process took six hours, according to me, or twenty minutes, according to Ryan.

The next, nicer nurse got my IV in on the first try, but in her haste to try to pump anti-nausea and pain relieving medicine into me, she pumped the anti-nausea stuff in too fast and blew out a vein in my hand. The anti-nausea medication made me throw up, which I proceeded to do for the next five minutes while she put the IV into the underside of my wrist and FINALLY administered some pain medication.

The pain medication didn't work.

Well, that's not entirely true. It turned my head into a balloon and made it float away. I began to fall asleep while screaming in agony -- one of the weirdest experiences of my life. Then I had to wait another fifteen minutes while they ran some blood work to make sure I wasn't pregnant before they pumped me full of something delightful that took away all my pain and got me high as a kite.

On the wheelchair ride down to get a CT, I kept trying to wave my lead-filled arms while shriek-slurring, "I'm flying, Jack!" Then I waved at everyone like I was in a parade and fell asleep in the CT machine.

Later in the morning, I had apparently passed the stone and gotten a diagnosis of a kidney stone, severe urinary tract infection, and a yeast infection. I am positive I only went in with the kidney stone and that they planted the other things on my person in order to charge me more.

P.S. Did you know my real name is Andrea? I'm not entirely sure I did until I was four years old because everyone called me Annie as a baby and have ever since.

Comments

[amanda]

Ouch. Hope you feel better. I think remembering shrieking "I'm flying, Jack" should help.

[Megan]

I knew your name was Andrea because Facebook told me. Although it confuses me every time I see it.

Don't get any more kidney thingummies. This is my advice for the day.

[Kerri Anne]

If I ever have to go to the hospital for any reason, I'm totally going to hire you to tell the story.

(I'm glad you're A-OK. Except for the whole your body might be staging a coup on you part.)

[Erika]

Kidneys that live in lass houses shouldn't make stones!

[Santoria Rush]

That is so messed up. I'm glad you found the problem(s) but to have all that going on and not even know it, doesn't seem right. Maybe you should get checked out more often.