"I went to the woods because I wanted to live deliberately. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life;
to put to rout all that was not life and not when I had come to die, discover that I had not lived." ~Henry David Thoreau

Wednesday, October 17, 2007

Very Rough Night

Last night was pretty dang bad. We had a terrible thunder/lightening storm that kept waking the kids up. Ethan was very scared by the whole thing. Then at 2:30 I woke up to feed Lauren and noticed that my left side was very sore. In my groggy state of mind I thought maybe I'd slept on it in a bad position. Then within a few minutes the pain intensified to an all too familiar pain that stabbed through my lower back, through my left hip, and around into my abdomen. It could only mean one thing. A kidney stone.

I got up to empty my bladder thinking maybe that would help (it rarely does) and I ended up throwing up. Cody was sleeping downstairs because he can't sleep with me getting up 2 and 3 times a night to feed the baby. I debated getting him up, but I decided to let him sleep for at least 2 more hours before waking him to help me. Misery does love company, but it would have been dumb to have both parents useless today due to lack of sleep. One of us needed rest.

So I suffered through an hour of the pain, then I remembered that I had a ton of Percocet left over. It wouldn't help a lot, but I would take any ounce of relief I could get. So I popped two of those (it's kind of the equivalent of taking an aspirin for a migraine headache, very weak). I got back into bed and actually started doing Lamaze breathing! I didn't remember much of it from when Ethan was born, but what I did do seemed to help a little. Passing a kidney stone is very similar to the pain of unmediated labor. Ask any women who has done both.

Well sometime around 5:30 I guess I fell asleep. Ironically when I woke back up for the next feeding, the pain had subsided immensely. I don't think I'm in the clear though because it typically takes a full 24 hours to pass one of those nasty suckers. It hurts the worst when it is on the move, so I think that right now it is sitting still in my left ureter. I'm on pins and needles waiting for it to move again. I've had the pleasure of giving birth to several kidney stones in the last five years. I can thank both of my parents for that because they each suffer from them too and the tendency to produce them is hereditary. Anyway, time will tell when this sucker finally ends it's journey. In the meantime it is pure hell.

Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket

This is what the little devils look like for anyone who hasn't had the joy of experiencing this kind of pain. They literally cut and tear the ureter wall while passing through. Then imagine pouring acid (urine) into the open wound. Ouch. Seriously, ouch!

4 comments:

Author said...

Poor thing. Hopefully it will pass quickly.

Miles and Bex said...

That sucks!!! You are way to nice to let Cody sleep, I would have woken Miles up instantly to go through the pain with me. I am so sorry. I hope that sucker passes soon.

Miles and Bex said...

That sucks!!! You are way to nice to let Cody sleep, I would have woken Miles up instantly to go through the pain with me. I am so sorry. I hope that sucker passes soon.

Kristi said...

You poor thing! I had to take my brother to the ER 2 nights ago for kidney stones, or so he thought. Anyways I have never had them and pray I never will!! Hope you feel better soon!