turns out colitis is bad news

[jinian]

My day in health went something like this:

8am-11am. Maybe dinner didn't quite agree with me. No big deal.

11am-11:15am. Yet now I have become completely unable to work due to abdominal pain, as if with the worst menstrual cramps I've ever had. I cannot load this gel, which is normally about the easiest thing I could do. It should go away soon?

11:15am-12:15pm. None of the various things that might help actually do. Notably, lying down on the couches in the lounge is amazingly uncomfortable and I have no idea how all those unconscious undergrads I keep seeing can sleep there, even when they are healthy. Although I have a lovely mat in my office, going there would involve walking and a modicum of thinking, so is not going to happen.

12:15pm. I call Wim to come and get me because I can't figure out how to leave the lab or get home on my own, or even if I should go home or to the ER, because holy fuck this hurts and it's not stopping.

12:30pm. Wim, having fortunately been headed to lunch with his dad, retrieves me quickly and takes me home. Consensus despite the major ow is to lie down for a while at least and see if it helps before I spring for the ER copay. They then go to lunch as planned, disgruntling me slightly, but I am very happy to be in bed.

3pm. Lying down definitely helps if I don't move (pain reduced from about 8 to 4, and do look at the link, especially if you know the regular pain scale well), but it still feels like there's a sea cucumber made of lead in my belly when I turn over or sit up. It transpires that my GP has left for the day; the receptionist recommends the ER. We call a consulting nurse, who is actually pretty good, and figures waiting some more and talking to an on-call doctor would be okay. I opt for the ER because I'm still really disturbed by sudden severe pain plus inability to go to the bathroom, and because I'm almost completely certain that an on-call doctor would ask me the exact same questions I'd just answered.

4:22pm. Admitted to ER.

Entering into weird ER time warp now. Wim is present throughout.

No one else in waiting room really, triage quick, gave blood and urine samples, waited for doctor. Talked to doctor, who on hearing that it was ovulation time and I'd had spotting sent me for an ovary ultrasound first.

Never had an ultrasound before, though I've seen it on my pregnant ex. I found my uterus much easier to recognize than some weird fetus was. Got gloopy stuff on my sides by my ribcage (kidney check) and my lower belly (uterus & ovaries). Uncomfortable but not bad at all.

And then there was the vaginal ultrasound. Sensation ranged from "that's kinda weird" to "ow honey, we need to change angles, you're banging into my cervix" to "oh jesus fuck please stop that NOW." (NINE. OW.) Unfortunately there was a lot of the last because my left ovary was all tucked up next to the area that really fucking hurt already, and they did have to look at it.

And you know, dripping sensations never help.

The tech was really nice, at least. I think it helps when they've had the procedure themselves, which she had. I asked worriedly if they practiced on each other in ultrasound school, and she said NO, so that was good!

I recovered some while she reported to the doctor, who might want a CT as well since you can't really see intestines on ultrasound. ER was busy so we got stashed in an X-ray room, causing slight confusion to X-ray techs later. Yep, need a CT. Waited for the IV team. Glad I had a book. The IV person was awesome when she arrived, yay specialists. I have easy veins, but even I noticed the difference.

CT is done on a sliding table like an MRI, but you just go in and out of a giant white doughnut, not a whole tube, and there's no thunking. I got the contrast stuff put in the IV -- so cool! One container squirts into the other one, then all goes into the IV, you get hot all over (which feels a lot like you peed, as they warn), and apparently then they can see stuff. The tech said the radiologists really like to see a five-minute delay scan for renal function, and because I am young and otherwise healthy she went ahead and did one for them. She compared their reaction to thinking something is on sale, going to buy it, and then it is on even more sale. Um, okay, I am down with making radiologists happy. I get all this on CD later, right?

About this time I'd been lying down for a couple of hours and feeling noticeably better, even when I had to move from bed to table. Good yet potentially embarrassing if my problem resolves without intervention! (Not to worry, it totally hurt more again later.)

Back to the ER. Waiting. Ran out of book eventually. (Crown of Stars is indeed quite good.) Doctor said I have a slightly odd kidney and an ovarian cyst, both within normal parameters -- the ultrasound tech figured the cyst was just from ovulation, and it's on the side that hurt much less anyway. But my white cell count is a little high, and there's inflammation around the colon, so they are treating it as colitis. This means an anti-nausea drug that I doubt I'll use, Percocet for pain, and Cipro to kill infection.

It always takes forever to get discharged from the ER. Eventually we went to the 24-hour pharmacy, took pills, and continued home.

11pm. I had a little chicken soup and orange juice, go me, and now am in bed. (Wim was less excited than I was when I successfully passed gas. He just doesn't know what it's like not to be able to!) I think I am not likely to go Dyke Marchin' tomorrow, but pain meds are YAY and treating what's wrong is even better.

Comments

[marzipan-pig.livejournal.com]

Thank you for posting recovery story. Sorry to be such a freak.

-gives your insides a stern getting-better sort of look with capys thrown in for good measure-

[marzipan-pig.livejournal.com]

PS that pain scale is (of course) our research machine's screen saver at work :-)

[jinian.livejournal.com]

Awesome. :)

If I'm still feeling too crummy tomorrow to go visiting overnight in Quilcene, will you be my person on call if I should need help? I've been pretty self-sufficient today so expect to be fine, but with Wim going out to visit his mom I want to make sure I have options. I'm not feeling as much better yet as I'd hoped.

[lakmiseiru.livejournal.com]

*hugs* Ok, that is not as good as I hoped it was (I was vaguely hoping for "owww migraine bad need pain relief nowww" but this is far better than "o hai large ovarian cyst" or pancreatitis or something). Thanks for texting me; you said you were ok, so I didn't freak out too much :^)

Love you, feel better soon! The raspberries were such a treat... and you did a pretty good job of not looking unhappy at 0945, at least as far as I could tell.

*hugs* some more for good measure

[jinian.livejournal.com]

*hugs* I felt fine at 0945, and not just because I got to see you. :)

[baratron.livejournal.com]

Sounds horrendous! Hope the intestines start behaving themselves soon.

Didn't know it was possible to get colitis from a random infection. Thought it was always a remitting-relapsing thing. Huh.

[jinian.livejournal.com]

I think it's like cervical cancer; there's the way you almost always see it, but there's always a few times that it arises for some screwy reason too. It's still a tentative diagnosis, too. I'll update when I see my GP after the weekend.