I was told that I would not remember much about my interactions with life yesterday, and I am pleased to announce that what I was told is true. I now see why the hospital makes you sign a piece of paper, vowing not to get behind the wheel for 24 hours. If I drove yesterday, as "fine" as I felt, I would have been no better than a drunk driver. I know I interacted with my family, I know I wrote a blog, I know I spoke with people on the phone, and made dinner. But most of that is remembered in a fog/haze/dreamlike way. Before the procedure, we were considering going to Ravinia yesterday to use some free tickets that I got from the library. Given the fact that Cyndi can't drive at night, we made the right choice.
Now that I have a possible diagnosis/plan to get myself regular, I have to deal with the other end: my stinky pee, the fact that I get up a couple of times a night to go pee, the occasional burning and pain in my lower back, and the two unfortunate nighttime episodes. I had an appointment last month to see a nephrologist (kidney specialist), but he had to cancel on me at the last minute due to a death in his family. When we finally met today, he seemed kind of baffled that I was there. I may even go so far as to say he was irritated that I was there. He was nice, but he was irritated.
When my doctor suggested I see a kidney specialist, he was torn. He said my issues could be nothing, it could be kidney related, or it could be a "structural issue." He suggested I could either see a nephrologist or a urologist. One roll of the dice, and the kidney doctor won me as his medical dilemma prize.
Since I have seen so many doctors and been to a lot of labs lately, I've seen the certain things in health care that are a waste of time. A prime example is paperwork. Every doctor you see asks you to complete a series of questions designed, understandably, to give your medical history to him/her. I really have no issue with that, specifically. What I don't like is taking my time to complete the paperwork, and then making me verbally answer the same questions repeatedly during the same visit.
It starts with the nurse, who obviously does not read my completed answers, and who re-documents everything I have written. It carries over to the doctor, who asks the same questions AND writes the same answers down again. A big suck of a waste of time. I'm not getting any younger, so I think my patience for things that make no sense, has gone down.
After all of my medical history was discussed, the nurse commented that I was pretty young to have these issues. She said, "you only have a couple of months on me...we're almost 40!" She also told me that my heart rate (53) was really good. I guess my worry yesterday that 47 was too low was nothing to be concerned about.
The doctor basically said I may have kidney stones or a urinary tract infection. I have to pee in a cup again, take some more blood work, and get a kidney ultrasound. If nothing shows up on any of the tests, then I have to go see a urologist. I've been going to one for over 20 years.
Maybe, in hindsight, I should have started there.
Props goes out to my friend, Matt Wood (http://www.wood-tang.com/) for coming up with another example of IBS. I must say, the most appropriate: I've Been Shitting...I can't believe I missed that one, but then again, I was heavily medicated when I wrote my entry yesterday. Is that a good thing?
No comments:
Post a Comment