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I've been in a hosp for 9 days passing Kidney stones.  Don't get them.  I passed a quarry full of stones.  Spent another 9 days recovering from 7 litres of water used to flush the suckers out.  Yesterday found out that on the 10th day my PM went into EOL  Replacement next Tuesday. 

Life is beautiful!

Domr


8 Comments

When life gives you lemons...

by cagedliberty - 2020-02-21 00:09:13

Most people make lemonade. Your body is so cool it prefers making kidney stones!! ; )

I hope you are feeling better from your renal adventures and lots of wishes and prayers for your upcoming heart adventure!

I send my best wishes for a speedy resolve of all your health issues

by Gemita - 2020-02-21 03:42:09

Oh Donr you don’t do things in half measures, do you, but I have a strong feeling that you are going to get through all this !  The kidney stones haven’t held you back and nor will anything else.

Good luck for next Tuesday and when you are up and running again, what are they going to do about your incisional hernia ??  Yes life is beautiful, especially when you reach our age, but it is all the more precious too and we don’t give up easily do we ?

I wish you a new lease of life very soon xx

I have some idea what you've been through

by crustyg - 2020-02-21 11:36:35

Did a urology job, back in the day, and saw quite a few patients with renal colic - the ladies were quite clear that childbirth was much *less* painful.

Used to run a kidney stones clinic, too!

Got the Voltarol suppositories?  They don't work for everyone, but they are brilliant for those for whom they do - way better than opioids.

Hope that the improvement contines, but the PM going EOL must have made you wonder if you'd upset someone.

Best wishes.

Don

by IAN MC - 2020-02-21 12:08:00

Are you certain that they were talking about your pacemaker when you heard them mention EOL ?

Definitely go for the childbirth option if you can.

Best wishes from the other side of the pond

Ian

 

Hope you feel better.

by PacedNRunning - 2020-02-21 12:52:37

Those suckers are awful. Hope they are all gone now. Best for surgery. 

i to

by new to pace.... - 2020-02-21 15:05:21

I to want to wish you well on your journey .

mary

Childbirth vs. Kidney Stones

by Marybird - 2020-02-21 17:42:21

Guess people's experiences vary, but I've been through both kidney stones and childbirth, and think the pain comparison is pretty much apples and oranges. I couldn't say which one is worse.

Then there was the time I had an injection of numbing stuff shoved down my big toenail ( which had a load of bleeding going on under it from a crush injury), so they could drill a hole in the nail to let the blood escape. That was a new kind of pain, maybe kumquats in comparison with the other two. 

DONR, joining my best wishes with the others for a speedy recovery for you and hope this will be a bad memory in the rear view mirror of your life before you know it. Mary

They aren't supposed to inject local into a digit to drill a hole in the nail!

by crustyg - 2020-02-22 08:12:07

One of the more exciting and gratifying activities in the ED is helping a patient with an exquisitely painful blood/fluid accumulation under a nail (usually after something heavy has been dropped on the digit).  The UK method is to take a metal probe, heat the end red-hot in a small alcohol burner and then rapidly apply the hot end to the nail, vertically over the blood accumulation.  Patients (you always warn them) fear that it's going to hurt like crazy, but there is no nerve supply to the nail itself (it's dead keratin) and the sudden reduction in pressure on the nail-bed (which has a lovely nerve supply) eliminates the pain, and the patient lets out a whoosh of air (everyone holds their breath by instinct) with relief.

Sterile dressing on the nail and send patient home.

I'm told the African equivalent is to inject some local into the toe that's been stung by a scoropion - hurts like crazy until the local takes effect and then the grateful patient goes home.  Apparently no-one ever forgets again to check their shoes/boots for a scorpion after this.

But you do set up a ring block before toe-nail avulsion for ingrowing toenail.  That really does hurt as the local swells the tissues (already painful from the infected tissue around the ingrowing part).  Not a nice thing to have happen.

Hope you're feeling better DonR.

You know you're wired when...

You run like the bionic woman.

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I wouldn't be alive if it wasn't for pacemakers. I've had mine for 35+ years. I was fainting all of the time and had flat-lined also. I feel very blessed to live in this time of technology.