Touring the Women's Center

On December 23rd Scott and I got to tour the women's center at the new Intermountain Medical Center hospital (is that the right name? I just call it the new IHC hospital on 54th and State). Unfortunately, it wasn't a planned tour.

I woke up at 4am the morning of the 23rd with sever back pain on my left side, just below my ribs-around my natural waistline. I wasn't sure but figured they were braxton hicks contractions and since I had read that changing positions helps I began pacing the living room. I didn't want to wake Scott up because I figured the pain would go away. The weird thing though was that the pain didn't come and go as I thought a contraction should. It was just sustained pain, sometimes bad enough to literally take my breath away! Well, after pacing and sitting I thought I'd try a warm bath. That helped a bit but I was freezing cold and couldn't get warm even in the tub. Next try was to turn up the heat and sit on the heater under a blanket to at least get back warm again. Scott found me there and convinced me to try the heating pad in bed. At about 6 I threw up and then fell blissfully to sleep!

The next morning the pain was gone but I was very sick to my stomach. At 11:35 I started getting contraction every ten minutes accompanied by at least nausea and more often, vomiting. After 30 minutes we called the Dr.'s office and left a message and then after an hour Scott convinced me that we should at least head over to the Dr.'s office. I couldn't believe how regular those contractions were. I could watch the clock and with a 1 minute margin of error, there would be a contraction and sickness!

On our way to the Dr.'s office the nurse called and directed us to the hospital. They checked us in, put on the heart monitor and contraction monitor and set up an IV so I could have two bags of fluid. I was apparently very dehydrated from all the throwing up. My urine sample came back with blood and other abnormal minerals so they were thinking bladder infection, which would explain the "kidney" pain in the night. They decided to do a catheter and do some more tests. They came back with kidney stones as the diagnosis!

After 4 hours, two bags of fluids, and Zofran (love that anti-nausea medicine!!!) I felt good, the contractions had stopped and they sent me home. They said that they didn't know if the stones had passed or not but there wasn't much they could do. I was to drink a lot and then suffer through whatever came next.

Christmas Eve morning I had another hour of back pain (another stone passing perhaps?) but this time the pain was a 8.5 rather than a 10. Then on the night of the 26th I had another bad bit of pain but this time it was more like a 7. Regardless, it all seems to have passed, my urine sample today at the Dr. came back normal and so I look to be in the clear.

They say that kidney stones are worse than labor so looks like I am all set, I've had a tour of the hospital, I know how to put on that funny gown with all the snaps and ties, I know how to wrap my monitor cords around my neck like a necklace when I have to visit the restroom, and I have had pain worse than labor! This is going to be a breeze when I go in for real in 9 weeks. (Can you believe I'm in the single digits? I realize that is still over two months but 9 weeks out of 40 seems so close!!!)