A Few Hours of Firsts - Part One

This time last week I wasn’t feeling the love for the day. I felt sluggish and generally blah. I couldn't put my finger on what it was so I figured it was just my intense dislike of going into the city for work, or even, this particular role. Either way, I had a doctor’s appointment were I knew I'd be required to give several samples that could help pinpoint the problem if it was physical.

Now comes a warning: this entry will be an over share on medical things. Stop reading now if you are of a delicate disposition.

The doctor’s appointment turned up nought. Nothing out of the ordinary, but I was poked, prodded and pricked as usual.

I went to work. Still didn't feel fabulous but now I knew it was in my head. I could cope with that so I made the best of my day. It ended up being quite productive, but as the day wore on, the feeling of listlessness increased.

Once home for the night I got all my chores out of the way early. I had a light evening meal and settled down with Cara and the laptop for a little Facebook time.

About 10 I was ready for bed, early for me, as I stood up I felt a sharp pain shoot from my right, lower back down to my groin. I'd felt pain like this before. It had been a couple of months before when I had a kidney cyst bleed. I knew the next half an hour was going to be extremely unpleasant. I was right.

The pain in my right built up and settled. The dull, thick, thudding, pain that comes after a heavy blow. It got louder. I could hear it pounding in my ears. I sat down, stood up, paced a bit. Then started the cycle again.

The pain spread across my back to my spine and beyond. Nothing I did could get me into a comfortable position. At one point I was on all fours with my arse in the air. If I'd had company they may have taken it as an invitation.

At one o'clock I decided a warm bath would do the trick. It did. For about 30 seconds. Then I could feel it again. Spreading across my back, sneaking around to the front and spreading fingers down across my pubis.

The cats were freaked. Cara was freaked and hiding on the bed like she'd been scolded. She'd done nothing wrong, but Mum was pacing the house rubbing her back and side and muttering, 'fu*k, fu*k, farrk' under her breath.

At one forty five in the morning, I dialled '000'.

'Please state the nature of your emergency.'

I explained and continued pacing while I waited. Somewhere in there I unlocked the front door and put a jumper by the door. I didn't need it then, after all I was sweating the sweat of a fevered fellow.

The Ambulance arrived about 10 minutes after I'd called. They asked me to sit down, I declined and explained why, they took me out the the flashing lights outside. As I closed the door I was left with the vision of terrified puppy eyes.

FIRST #1: Ambulance ride as a patient.

The journey was less than smooth, not because of the driving, that was great. The painkillers they tried to give me smelled so sickly sweet it made me vomit, which made me pee a little, which caused a few tears, which in turn commenced the apologies. It's a chain reaction. I know they see this and much worse every day, but I still felt I needed to acknowledge my humble thanks to them saving me.

I threw up all the way to the hospital. By the time I got there I was wearing wet pyjama bottoms and I had well and truly started tumbling down the shame spiral. For no other reason than I was a 39 year old who wet her pants while vomiting.

My blood pressure on entry to the hospital was 149/111. Trust me, if you know nothing about blood pressure, that isn’t good.

The nurse told me off for leaving it so long before calling an ambulance because I was close to ‘stroking out’.

I was put in a ‘sub-acute’ room and given two Panadol.

A Few Hours of Firsts - Part Two

I brought the Panadol back up about ten minutes after I’d taken them, just enough time for them to dissolve and cause acid burning on the return journey. The doctor hadn’t seen me yet so they couldn’t give me anything stronger. I was still pacing.

‘On a scale of one to ten, what your pain level?’

‘Ohh..about a twelve.’

After an hour, the doctor came in. He asked me how the pain in my tummy was. I corrected him, politely. Considering the discomfort I was in I was remarkably calm and polite, but then it doesn’t pay to p*ss off the doctor on duty.

He asked, ‘do you have a history of kidney stones?’

‘Nooo....’

‘Your symptoms are classic kidney stone. We need to get some pain medication into you.’

I didn’t say it, but my head screamed ‘No shi*t, Sherlock!’

‘I’ll come back and get a canular into you’ He did come back and proceeded to stuff it up. He hurt me for no reason.

A nurse came back and tried again. My blood pressure was so high that when she stuck the needle in it was like a scene from Scream. There was blood on my pjs, the floor the chair and her. The pain from my kidneys was refocused to the back of my left hand. But it went in and shortly afterwards 10mg of morphine was wending it’s way up my arm. I could feel it. And I’m pretty sure it showed on my face. If I ever had to portray a heroin addict in a Hollywood blockbuster, now I could. My first drugs, ever. Not counting booze.

FIRST #2: Class A drugs

Twenty minutes later, ‘On a scale of one to ten, what your pain level?’

‘About a 5.’

‘To ensure I’m giving the drugs to the right person, what’s your name?’

‘Clarissa Dalloway.’ The look on the nurses face was priceless, she clearly didn’t get, a)the literary reference or, b)the party reference. I quickly gave her my real full name and she relaxed.

‘For someone in so much pain, you’ve sure kept your sense of humour.’

‘Laugh or cry, laugh or cry. It’s pretty simple really.’

10mg more. Once again I could feel the cool travelling up my arm, this time the pain went down to zero.

Over the course of the next six hours I had my blood pressure checked, I had a thermometer stuck in my ear and I continued vomiting. I also had another 15mg of the good stuff. By this time there was only the lining of my stomach to come up and I was still sitting in my pee soaked pants. I was ‘nil by mouth’ so not even water was coming up, just bile past the Panadol burn of earlier. No one had any chewing gum.

I fell in a drug induced sleep between pokes and prods.

I relented and changed into a hospital gown.

I was taken to a CT scan in the morning. I was still vomity and still being given morphine for the pain. I was told, ‘some people just can’t handle the drugs.’ I was pleased to know that I’d be a rubbish addict, but less than please to know that I would continue to feel nausea and the resulting retching until the pain was gone.

FIRST #3: CT Scan

After the scan I was return to my room, after throwing up and wetting myself again. Having a canular in the back of my hand restricted my pacing ability when the pain returned, as it did as soon as I moved or threw up.

Dr. Chong, a resident in Urology came to see me with the CT results.

‘You have three kidney stones. Two in the right, and one in the left. The one in the ureter (the pipe between the kidney and bladder) is the one causes all the problems. It’s stuck. We need to loosen up your muscles so they relax.’

I asked to see the scans. So i wheeled my fluids bags out to the desk where the computer was and had a look. Dr. Chong thought it was hilarious that I wanted to see.

I wanted to see the little bugger that was causing all the problems. A tiny white dot on a screen or black and grey.

FIRST #4: kidney stones

I’m the first to admit that I generally like stones. The Rolling Stones, the shiny white one you use in your garden to stop weeds, the flat type that skim across the water and bounce when thrown, just right, even the little ones that get caught in your shoe and give you a clippity cloppy sound when you walk. I’m not a fan of Kidney Stones.

A Few Hours of Firsts - Part Three

FIRST #5: I was admitted to hospital.

Tuesday was pretty much a write off. I dozed in a morphine induced stupor. I was woken only for my blood pressure and temperature checks.

I do remember throwing up when one of the nurses came to introduce herself to me. I apologised for that later.

Dinner was delivered, despite a big, red, NBM sign hanging from my bed. The smell taunted me, and brought on waves of nausea, but didn’t bring anything up. I was very glad when it was removed.

At 8.15 the lights were turned out. I vividly recall making a comment about being on a ward for 12 year olds and the Sri Lankan lady opposite giving a belly laugh. The weird thing was, they then left on the bathroom light that lit up the whole ward. They also continued to visit us with pills, arm cuffs for BP and ear thermometers.

About 9.30 a nurse came to check my vitals again and put the cuff on the same arm as my hand canular. Bearing in mind that I was still on IV fluids, she pumped the cuff up to get a reading...as it filled with air I could feel the pressure in the back of my hand building. Just as it released it pressure on my arm I was about to swear at the nurse to ‘get the fu*king thing off me’, she was spared by a fraction of a second.

The following morning she did the same thing at 0515.

I requested nicely that she use the other arm. She apologised and moved to the right.
By now all my dignity had deserted me, so it wasn’t an issue that I had to let the nurses know when I needed to pee. They had the strain it to see if there was anything in it. After my nine am constitutional the nurse came back and rattled a pot at me.

‘It’s out!’

‘Squeeeeeeeee’. I was very excited. It meant I didn’t have to have a stent put in. That sounded really nasty.

This meant I could go home. Yeah!

A 3mm ball of calcium deposit caused so many problems in a short amount of time and so much elation in even less.

FIRST #6: Passed kidney stones

Bumbershoot

I don’t mind the rain in Australia, because it is rarely accompanied with a biting wind.  We’ve had a very wet Summer and it looks set to continue.  We have had a few sunny days, but they have been extremely humid due to the amount of moisture in the ground.

Monday was a good example of such a day.  31 degree in the city with 92% humidity.  It was like wading through soup, if wading through soup meant it would be difficult to breath, your skin would feel clammy and you smells really bad at the end of the day.

Tuesday brought with it, a shift in the winds, from North Westerly’s to south easterly, bringing a cool change.  It’s been less than 20 degree for the last couple of days, with persistent rain, but it isn’t, by any means cold.

When it not cold, I try to avoid wearing a coat.  It makes me feel hot.  So to avoid getting wet I  stick close to building and under canopies where I can.  Unfortunately, others of the human species do not share my desire to have one less thing to carry.

And the umbrellas come out in force.

All shapes, sizes, colours and states of repair.

Today, I saw a woman walking along under two thirds of a brolly.  It was basically three metal spikes and a tiny piece of fabric clinging for dear life to the remaining three disguised spikes.  It couldn’t have just happened, because it isn’t windy and the rain is coming down straight.  How long had it been getting to this stage.  Surely a few well place stitches and it would be as good as new?

One woman of extremely small stature had an umbrella as wide as she was tall.  She was wielding it like a weapon.  She had it resting on her left shoulder and as she walked the pedestrians parted like the Red Sea.  They had no choice.  At one point she was waiting for the traffic lights to change, she turned to look at the oncoming cars, as she turned (not just her head) the massive awning swung with her and pushed another lady into the road from behind.  It just swept her up.  The owner was completely oblivious.

I’m not a huge fan of umbrellas.  When they were small fashion accessories, called parasols, that a lady took to picnics in the park and to the races to protect their delicate English skin from the sun and the inappropriate advances of gentleman.  They had an elegance and grace about them.  There were used when stationery, when leisurely walking with a suitor they would be space around, Ladies never hurry anywhere.

Now, in an age where people rarely give consideration to their fellow man or woman and are nearly always in a rush, they are yet another peril to watch out for.