Hello beautiful people, I would like to thank all my lovely customers who have given me their love, support and well wishes over the past 5 months. The cards, phone calls and visits have truly touched my heart. Not only has our shop made others feel welcome and loved but you have given the same in return.
To all that do not know, here is the story of what has been happening to me over the past 5 months.
On Feb 15th whilst in Sydney with my man celebrating Valentine’s Day, I was struck with a sharp pain in my stomach. The pain did not leave me; its intensity changed but stayed with me 24/7. The pain felt kind of familiar; last year I had a few cysts on my ovaries which dispersed on their own. With this in mind I went to see my doctor and gave him my diagnosis (lol I always do that, usually I am right too). He agreed with me we decided not to do ultrasounds as the “supposed” cyst would probably pass. He wrote me a referral to a Gynaecologist at Modbury Hospital as I had had enough of these women problems and wanted to see what my options were.
In the meantime the pain increased and no pain killers were working. The pain was starting to affect my daily life. Three weeks later whilst getting the shop ready for open, mum sent me to the Modbury Hospital emergency room as this had gone on long enough. It was clear at this point that something more was going on here. I spent from 11.30am to 1am the next morning being drugged up and seen by many different nurses and doctors having to repeat the story over and over.
At about 7pm, I managed to finally convince the doctor to give me a CT scan as all the meds they were giving me were ineffective. The scan came back that I had a 5mm kidney stone which was high up appearing to have just come out of the kidney. They told me that hospitals only remove them when they are 6mm so I was to go home, drink 2litres of water every day and in another week have another CT scan. They tried to keep me in the hospital until my pain was under control but I demanded to leave after 3hrs had passed and the pain was the same. I had asked for a blanket as I was cold and asked about food as I had not eaten that day and received no response. I decided if I was going to suffer like this, I may as well be at home.
A week passed, many litres of water had been forced down and still no relief. I was scheduled for another CT scan at Dr Jones and Partners who concluded the same result and the kidney stone had not moved. Back to the doctor I go… My wonderful GP wrote a referral letter to the Royal Adelaide Hospital and Lyell Mac. We did not bother with Modbury as they told me they do not deal with kidney stones. Royal Adelaide told me that the waiting list is up to a year and Lyell Mac was a few months. The pain was now becoming a living nightmare. My poor man Wojciech who was still living in Sydney at this time was franticly sending out emails to private doctors to see what our options were.
Two months had passed and I finally got an appointment with a private urologist who I can’t remember the name of. He was seemingly wonderful, looked at my scans and agreed that the kidney stone appeared to be stuck and was not going anywhere on its own (no matter how much I water I drank). He did not want me to have another CT scan which was recommended as he was concerned about the overexposure of radiation at my age. So he got on the phone to the Repat hospital where he would perform the surgery and put me on the waiting list (which would be 1 to 2 weeks).
At last some help! I was happy; there was at last some light.
However, 4 days later, mum took me to the Repat emergency room as I couldn’t wait any longer – this thing had to come out! They were wonderful; they took me in straight away to be seen. They admitted me into the hospital and scheduled the surgery for the following day.
Click here for Part 2 – Kidney Stones, Misdiagnosis & a Stent
