Jump to content
Science Forums

Kidney Stones... AAAAAARRRRGGHHH!!!


Recommended Posts

Right. Anybody had 'em before? What to do?

 

I woke up Sunday morning with what I thought was back spasms. I tried to get out of bed, and ended up crying like a little girl. I popped some serious kick-*** pain killers and muscle relaxants, and was able to shuffle out of bed at around 2pm. I thought it would get better, but it just got worse as the week dragged on.

 

And last night I barely slept at all.

 

Haven't been to work since Wednesday, and I had to send my baby girl to her aunt today because I can't even pick her up.

 

So last night I surfed the web to find a cause for my ailment. And the only thing fitting my symptoms are kidney stones. Yet, there is just one discrepancy with my (admittedly dangerous) self-diagnosis - and that is that the pain I've got is perfectly symmetrical. According to everything I've read on the 'web, you get a sharp jabbing pain in the kidney that's about to pass the stone. So it will be asymmetrical. If this is kidney stones, then both kidneys have simultaneously grew a stone of roughly the same size, and both started hammering me at the same time.

 

I also read that the only pain this can be compared with is natural childbirth - and if I do have them stones, I can certainly testify to that.

 

So - anybody had 'em? Any tips? Any advice? The best I've read so far is to swallow a tablespoon of olive oil and a tablespoon of lemon juice, and then proceed to have a considerable amount of beer. By the time you pass the stones, you'll be sufficiently anesthetized. Sounds like my kinda remedy.

 

IT HURTS LIKE FUGGIN' HELL, MAN!!!!!!!!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yeah a doctor would be a good idea.

 

Otherwise (=if it is just the stones), what people I know did is as you said, drinking (they took water though and not beer ;-) ). A few liters per day, the more you have to pee the quicker the stones will be out ;-). But watch out to not get a water intoxication (no joke)...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Didn't see a quack 'cause I thought it was muscle spasms. I was considering a physiotherapist.

 

I have just come back from the quack, and, lo and behold, it be kidney stones. He gave me a course of pills to work through, basically a diuretic that makes me pee like a... like a... well, something that pees a lot.

 

And he told me it's gonna take about ten days. Ten days and lots o' water.

 

It still hurts like a *****.

 

Funny enough, I've always been under the impression (for some reason or another) that kidney stones is a beer drinker's ailment.

 

Turns out that the best medicine for preventing kidney stones is about two beers a day.

 

What does screw you up is coffee and red meat (and I'm guilty to the n'th degree on both counts. I pop about ten-fifteen cups of coffee a day, and a day without a steak is a wasted day. Guess I've got some adjustments to make.)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I had a kidney stone in 1979.

I put away a nice supper of baked chicken and veggies, and after an hour or so, had what I thought was a tummy ache. Bad chicken? Impossible. Took some Alka Seltzer. Sudden nausea, and I lost my supper on the living room rug. Then back pain, but not too bad. Decided to go to bed early. Woke up an hour later in agony. Sitting up was damn near impossible! Called for an ambulance. Then I remembered the front door was locked.

 

I dragged myself into my wheelchair, avoiding sitting straight up, screamed every step of the way into the living room, unlocked the front door, backed up six feet and threw myself out of the chair and onto the floor. That's where they found me 10 minutes later. At the hospital they gave me a big shot of nofeelums. The pain was still so bad I had to rock back and forth on the bed and moan (in 3-part harmony) and tell really bad jokes to the nurses.

 

Next AM they let me go with a bottle of pain pills that kept my head at 50,000 feet and mach 2. Told me to drink LOTS of fluids and pee through a strainer. Four days later, I was peeing and suddenly felt a series of sharp tickles down my penis and plop, there it was in the strainer, about half the size of a ladybug, and all pointy and craggy and nasty-sharp looking. The residual pain disappeared.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On the plus side, people I've known to get them have become devout fans of drinking lots of water, which is never a bad thing (except for extreme cases, like the water "poisoning" that sanctus mentioned).

 

And hey...now you've got an excuse to drink beer everyday. :shrug:

 

I'm sure you've researched this up and down, but here's a quick link I found with some good advice. Have you got a heat pad?

 

How to Encourage Kidney Stones to Pass | eHow.com

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I had a kidney stone in 2004. I was preparing to move from Colorado to Ohio. I was only home on weekends and spent them prepping the house for sale; making all those repairs that I would never bother with if I were staying in the place. One of them was replacing the huge electrical insulator that acted as my mail box post. It was really cool until the kids chipped pieces off of it with a hammer. Anyway, after dinner it was a cool summer evening and I went outside to evaluate how to get the couple hundred pound beast loose from the ground and out. As I was poking around it I was feeling uncomfortable. Nothing that shook me, but just general discomfort. I wandered into the house and started checking out the end room where I had to replace the floor boards. I don't know when, but at some point I laid down on the floor. I must have been laying there for a few minutes when Shannon came in and asked me if I was all right, did I need to see the doctor. She nearly **** when I said, yeah, I needed to see a doctor right away. It was total body discomfort. The pain was not in any specific place. I felt nauseous, I felt pain. Pain like I should be able to get rid of it if I just got into a more comfortable position, or could cool off.

 

As Shannon drove me to the hospital I was starting to get scared about what might be wrong with me. I was to the point of telling Shannon to run through red lights or whatever it would take to get me to the hospital before I died. It seemed like forever before I got to the hospital - about a ten minute drive. As I walked up to the admitting nurse she looked at me and said, "You have a kidney stone, go sit over there." I guess I was not hiding it very well.

 

At that point I was having waves of varying levels of discomfort. From unbearable agony to bearable agony. At one point after they had done enough tests and asked enough questions to have a real diagnosis the nurse told me, "I am going to get you something for the pain, I'll be right back." Then I watched that heartless callous ***** walk from room to room and person to person for about 20 minutes as I moved from standing to laying down, to sitting, to laying on the floor, to leaning on the wall, desperate to find a comfortable position that would ease the incredible discomfort I was feeling. Finally I went out into the hall, tapped her on the arm, and reminded her that she was going to be "right back" and that I was still waiting. She got defensive and scolded me back into the room; Shannon was yelling at me to calm down and not be such a bother. 20 minutes later she came back with a pill for me to take, but it was not for pain. She said that they needed the doctor to OK that and it would be a little longer.

 

They ended up giving me Demerol, which doesn't so much relieve pain as make you not give a damn about it. I was at the hospital for about three and a half hours. About an hour before I left the agony went away, not from the Demerol, but from natural progression. They prescribed me Vicodin, gave me a few little nets to piss through, and sent me home.

 

I got up early the next morning and was getting a quote from a contractor for doing some work in the bathroom when I was overcome by an intestinal emergency and somewhere in the midst of that I managed to catch the stone. Tiny little thing. Like a small grain of sand. Makes you wonder how it could cause so much fuss.

 

Three hours later I was on a plane to Ohio and back to work. I never filled the prescription (Shannon did, but that is another story) and if I had known that the pain was going to end when it did I would not have bothered with the hospital and the shot. Trouble is you can't know when it is going to end, and that discomfort will drive you to drastic measures. My kidney stone was only for a couple hours, I cannot imagine what it is like to live through that for days. The only encouragement I can give you is that when it does subside it is over. The stone causes the pain, and when it passes the pain is gone.

 

The advice I got from my doctor was to make sure and eat calcium. He said the stones formed because you don't have enough calcium in your diet and your body starts to strip it from within itself, but it cannot metabolize that and it forms into stones. So contrary to the notion of cutting back calcium to prevent stones, you must actually take more. Good luck!

 

Bill

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Sorry to hear about that. Supposedly in my area kidney stones are common, and they say it might be something to do with the high calcium content of the water and high consumption of red meat here. I've not experienced kidney stones, but then again my diet doesn't have a lot of red meat or dairy in it. I've not had any problems with high coffee consumption. Pushing 4-8 espressos a day.

 

Best wishes, Honorable Cow, and may you pee freely.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I had a kidney stone in 1990. I passed out alot the first few days and ended up at the emergency room on the 3rd day. They inserted a catheter and voila! out it rolled..looked like 10 to 15 grains of sand stuck together....however my daughter has had many..the last 2 were the size of dimes and she had to have a stent put in to unblock her ureter (by the time she was admitted she had septicemia of the kidney) and 6 lithotripsy's to break them up so she could pass them. Best way to find out if their small enough to pass is with a Cat Scan..no contrast! Good luck..Dilaudid was the only thing that touched the pain for me.

 

I wouldn't wish a kidney stone on anyone..umm, ...that's a lie..I can think of a few people I'd wish em on ;)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

.... I was afraid I was gonna die last night. Right now, though, I'm afraid I'm not going to die.
Henk,

if it hasn't passed through by now, maybe you should have it broken up with sonic waves.

And what kind of pills did they give you? They sound worthless.

 

Worried. ;)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

...and now I've got a horrible bout of the 'flu on top of my kidney stones.

 

Every time I cough my kidneys tear apart.

 

This is the worst pain I have ever experienced.

 

I was afraid I was gonna die last night. Right now, though, I'm afraid I'm not going to die.

 

Once it is over, you will probably be glad you are not dead. :Exclamati

Though I've never had a kidney stone, I can certainly imagine what it must be like as I've suffered similar "discomforts" of life (like being kidnapped in Tijuana, ruptured spleen, unmovable back spasms, etc.).

 

Keep smiling! :Exclamati

 

F'n life, eh?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
×
×
  • Create New...