Annual Visit to Hommerton

My entire life before coming to the UK I have only been to the hospital once. When I was eight or so, because I had the flu and my mother was worried about me. Last year, right before the new year, I was in the hospital for a rather memorable occasion that I described here. Really, that was a cake-walk compared to my Monday night. Or, really, it wasn't. Just something entirely different.

I've been having what I thought was lower back pain for a few days. Bad cramping and uncomfortable feelings. Sunday night the pain actually woke me up from sleep which I found unusual and disturbing. But Monday I was just downing lots of water thinking maybe it was something with my kidneys and I would flush it out. And Monday seemed to go well, until the afternoon when I got a horrible attack of pain. So I called my GP for an emergency appointment and left work.

On the way to the GP, I was having such bad pain on the bus I thought I would pass out. I managed to find a position where the pain wasn't so severe and it lessened and passed. I made it to the GP and explained what had been going on and he said to me it sounded like kidney stones. Charming. So he wanted a urine sample and gave me a prescription for pain medication. After peeing I started to feel the pain come on again. By the time I'd left the GP I was hobbling to the pharmacy. By the time I got home, the pain was excruciating. By the time I got upstairs to my bedroom I was incoherent.

I ended up puking up whatever was left of my lunch and then some. Barely able to make the three meter journey from my bedroom to the toilet. I couldn't take the pain pill, I couldn't drink water, I couldn't find any position that was remotely comfortable and I was writhing on the floor. I figured I needed to go to the hospital but could barely figure out how I was going to do that. I called tlsd but she wasn't answering. I called my neighbor but she wasn't answering either. I went and puked some more. Then I called emergency. They patched me through to the ambulance people who called and wanted to know why I couldn't get around the corner myself. Crying hysterically on the phone I pointed out if I could get around the corner on my own, I wouldn't have called emergency and since I was crying and in obvious pain they said they'd send someone, but it was a busy night.

I managed to get myself downstairs in preparation for emergency people coming- and found myself stuck at the bottom of the stairs writhing and sobbing in pain. My neighbor returned my call and I asked her to come over. She saw the state of me, well, that and I had to crawl to the door to open it, not being able to stand, and said she would call a cab to take me to the hospital. She got her sons to help me get out the door and my jacket on me and some shoes. I was now hobbling down the walk and puking into a Sommerfield bag. About halfway down the stairs, the ambulance showed up. So we cancelled the cab and they strapped me into a chair on the stair landing and carried me the rest of the way to the ambulance.

Getting inside, they transferred me from chair to gurney and tried to give me some air thing to breathe that was supposed to help the pain slightly but wasn't. It wasn't a very long ride and I don't remember much of it aside from trying to breathe and crying with the pain. We got to the hospital and they took me out in the gurney and into the A&E, wheeling me into one of the exam cubes after a brief discussion with whoever was distributing cases to rooms. They wanted to get a line into my arm and take some blood and also get me on some pain medication. The line went in without too much trouble, but no blood was coming out. I was shaking so bad from the pain that they said they'd try some pain relief before trying for blood again.

So the nurse or SHO came in to give me my first pain medication- in the form of a suppository. I tell you what, I didn't even care, if it was going to make it better, that was all that mattered. So over I rolled and in it went and I waited, searching the pain in my body for the slightest change in intensity. None was forthcoming. I was still in a terrible amount of pain. They injected an anti-nausea drug into the line in my arm which made me feel slightly better and then I got a different pain drug injected into the line in my arm. None of which felt nice being pushed into the line, but certainly nothing compared to the amount of pain I was in.

The guy came back and managed to get a little bit of blood out of my other arm after two attempts. They left me alone in the cube and I felt an intense need to puke again, even though I knew there wasn't anything to throw-up. So I managed to get myself off the gurney and grab one of the vomit bowls stacked in the corner, return to the gurney and dry heave into the bowl. I could hear someone else heaving somewhere in the A&E which was almost funny as I think we pushed each other onto it a bit with the noise, or, it would have been funny if I could think coherently.

Eventually I found a position that I could bear staying still in even though I was still hurting and managed to doze off a little bit. My neighbor appeared at this point, having given her boys dinner and then come to see how I was doing at the hospital. I also got my third dose of pain killer at this point. At some point I got a fourth injection of painkiller which by now had been upgraded to morphine. And eventually the doctor came to do an exam. He said I needed some xrays to make sure that I wasn't having any sort of blockage- and that they had to do this by injecting me with dye. The pain started to be bad again, so he said I could have another dose of morphine, but they took me off to xray before I got it.

So in the xray area I was in complete agony again needing to hold still and lay flat (which was the most painful) while they took the various xrays. Then I got injected with dye and had to wait for it to absorb until the next round so I curled up in a ball on the xray table in pain. They got the final xrays and wheeled me back to A&E but instead of to the cube I was put in the observation room. At that time, I was the only person in there even though the room was capable of holding four others. I think I was given my missing morphine at that point and I must have passed out. I know my neighbor left, but I don't remember anyone coming to look at the xrays, but when I came to they were gone.

They kept me there overnight. I woke up every hour or two in mild pain, but not as severe as it was. At some point the new on-call doctor came and told me that the xray had been clear and there was no blockage. So they kept me overnight and gave me some more painkillers around 4am on request. Throughout the night others were put into the observation room so that it was full by morning. I got breakfast and a box of codeine and then they said they would release me.

I got tlsd to meet me at the hospital and help me get home by way of my GP so I could drop off the hospital note which included a request for a further scan at some point, and I've been home all day since.

Apparently kidney stones and childbirth are the most painful things you can go through. Trust me when I tell you this experience gives me no additional desire to experience the latter.