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December 04, 2006
I've got your old ID and you're all dressed up like the Cure
It's me! I'm home! Yay!
Francis did a rather brilliant job of providing updates, so I'm here to give you the final score and the color commentary.
Sunday afternoon I saw a urologist who told me that because the kidney stone was so fucking enormous (or words to that effect), there was no chance in hell I'd pass it on my own, and they'd have to pulverize it. In the meantime, however, my kidney was near exploding, because the stone was blocking my ureter (hence all the WILDLY EXCRUCIATING PAIN OMG). So he felt he should put in a stent to open up the passage.
My first reaction upon hearing this was, "Hmm. That sounds plausible. I wonder what Google has to say about it?" But I was in the ER with NO GOOGLE and had to make a medical decision just using the brain in my head, instead of relying on the lobe of my brain I keep in the ether. I said "Hell yes" and he told me he'd do it at 7pm. The procedure itself was Not So Bad, although I felt a bit shaky just before it -- the sort of shaky with repeating thoughts of "I have just signed a consent form to let them put WHAT? WHERE? Dude!" But it all went just fine.
Afterwards I got my first full night's sleep in several days, even with a catheter and a IV drip -- it was Just That Good to be not in pain and in a real bed. My room-mate tells me (because *her* medical problem and treatments kept her up all night) that not only did I snore (probably because I was heavily drugged and flat on my back) but that I also talked in my sleep. Something about someone who "had no respect". I wish I knew more! The idea of things I say in my sleep *fascinates* me.
This morning was all straightforward; I had a list of things to accomplish before they'd let me out. They removed the catheter, I had breakfast, I peed on my own (yay!), I saw the urologist. And then they gave me some prescriptions and let me go. Wheeeeeee! I have never been so happy to brush my teeth, or take a hot shower, or lie on my own dear couch knitting. Mmmmm.
The lithotripsy is going to be in a couple of weeks, when I get back from a short trip to DC and a longer trip to see my mom. He could have done it on Wednesday, but said that since the stent-insertion is a little traumatic, and lithotripsy is a little traumatic, he'd rather space them out more, and having the stent in for two weeks is not a big deal. I'm not in any kidney-related pain at all anymore, so I'm inclined to agree.
THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU for all the nice notes and calls and everything -- it's made the whole thing a little more bearable to be able to remember that My Team is enormous and loving and wonderful, and the kidney stone is just a little 7mm scrap of mineral. We will vanquish the fucker!
There are many funny human-interest anecdotes I could relate, but I should go lie back down on the couch. Here's one, though. My room-mate, Peggy, was 63, a lifelong Windsor Terrace resident (she lives right around the corner from me). She said very sweet, but slightly strange, things to me all night and morning. "Are you a writer? You have a beautiful vocabulary," is one example. This morning she sat chatting with me about her life, which I drew her out on. Somewhere in there she asked, "So, is that goth? What you do with your hair and that little earring over your eye?" I let her know that I've got my own thing going on, and it doesn't so much have a name. (^_^)
Posted by Rose at December 4, 2006 05:19 PM
Comments
I hope your stent is minding its own business and not attached to a tube or string that's dangling out—my sister had a removable stent in place for about five days after they pulled her stone out of her ureter, and it drove her bonkers.
It sounds testicular to say, "You've got huge stones!"—but I thought kidney stones were usually more like grains of sand. A 7-mm stone would be uncomfortable enough in my shoe, but in my kidney? Yeow.
Posted by: Orange at December 4, 2006 06:48 PM
Yay! Glad you're home and (relatively) better!
Posted by: I. at December 4, 2006 06:54 PM
Whoa, a stent on a string would SUCK! Nope, this stent is hanging out with one end in my bladder and one end in the open space of my right kidney, the length of it in my right ureter.
I think 7mm *is* pretty big, actually, as these things go. It's not record-setting or anything, but it's big enough to win me two nights in the hospital and a lot of complicated procedures. Weird!
Have mentioned how happy I am to be HOME? Because dude, yes, HOME! Yay!
Posted by: Rose at December 4, 2006 07:08 PM
So glad you're home!
I've been racking my brain for kidney-stone themed things to send you. Probably a good thing that I can't think of any, right?
Posted by: Erin at December 7, 2006 12:07 PM