This, Too, Shall Pass

"Maybe it's gas," I told myself at 11:30 p.m. Monday night.
I knew better.
First the hint of ache. Then the increased intensity of pain until it hit a "10."
Oh yea, here we go -
into the hot bath to sooth my flank and calm my tensed body.
Up and down. Unable to sit or lay still.
Pounding water - watching the clock.
4:30 a.m. came and went.
ER or not?
This time I decided to tough it out. I had an old bottle of Vicodin on hand so I decided to pop one.
It helped.
So, I am now tethered to my toilet as I drink gallons of water, pee, and wait to pass a
5 mm stone.
I know it's 5 mm because when I awoke from my Vicodin- induced- grog, I made an appointment with my urologist, Dr. Khonsari,  who sent me to get a CT Scan
Stone protocol the radiology referral read.
I know this protocol.
Anything less than 6 mm is passable unless it gets stuck in the urator. Mine is stuck in the left urator.
But I'm still gonna try to pass it.
"You are experienced at this," Dr. Khonsari said to me on the phone today.
Yep, I sure am.
My first stone was at eighteen. It came in December of 1977 after a company party in Laguna Beach.
My most memorable stones were the ones I gave birth to days after both of my children were born  having to leave them in the care of my mother as I went back to the hospital pumping my breast milk while writhing in pain.
The calcium pills I had taken while pregnant produced healthy bones for my babies and a bonus for me.
My most inconvenient stones have come in the midst of production - Carousel in 1995 and most recently, during rehearsal for Les Mis in 2012.
My most surprising stone was in November of 2006 just before Thanksgiving. I was laying on a massage table during my Dahn yoga days as the practitioner shook my legs. Apparently she shook too hard, because I had to get up from the table and excuse myself in kidney stone agony before the session was over.
My biggest was 9 mm and caused me all sorts of grief including a kidney infection. That stone was so stubborn, Dr. Khonsari had trouble pulverising it. Passing the fragments from that monster was like passing a quarry of miniature stones.
There have been other, less remarkable stones I can barely recall.  I know I'm up to at least eighteen -possibly more.
So today, I went to Whole Foods between potty breaks. I bought myself some magnesium powder to drink to help me better absorb calcium, and an herbal supplement called "Stone Free" which hopefully will live up to its name.
This was actually my second trip to Whole Foods this week. Last week, I went to pick up some Vitamin D and Cod Liver Oil for my new low sugar regimen.
Changing one's life takes a lot of work, commitment, time, and research.
It all started with my labs.  Not horrible. Not scary. Just bad enough to be a "wake up call."
Low Vitamin D, High Sugar. Not in the Diabetic range but "at risk."
Notation: Can be reversed with diet and exercise.
And so I plunged in.
Back to the gym. Riding the bike. Gentle yoga.
Walking.
Reading recipes, trying new ones.
Thanks to my niece, Marisa, I have discovered the Paleo diet to control blood sugar.
Farewell to sugar in my coffee. With two cups a day, a spoonful of sugar in each - I was consuming 14 spoons full of sugar each week! Stevia is no replacement and I will always long for my delicious cup of sweet coffee every morning, but I'm adjusting.
Goodbye Rice. Pasta. Beans. (Though I'm reluctant to forego my legumes!)
I've discovered a fabulous cauliflower and cilantro recipe as a replacement for rice and I even dried my own herbs to make various herbal salts. I think I'm a fanatic now.
Well kind of. I am going to have to slowly ween myself off of my weekend wine.
The balancing act of lowering blood sugar by eating the good kind of carbs, fat, and protein and the dietary restrictions to reduce kidney stone production is tricky.
I might have ignored the latter had it not been for this latest episode. Lucky for me, my life style change coincided with my latest kidney stone attack which I am quite certain was brought on by my increased exercise! Go figure.
All that moving around jarred that little sucker loose!
So that is how my summer is shaping up. Or, more to the point,  this is my summer of getting into shape!
My niece says, "Health is everything."
She is right.  I have been the first to point my finger at denial but have not looked closely at my own.
When you ignore your body, it will get your attention one way or the other.
Mine is screaming out pretty loud for me to take care of it.
So they say confession is good for the soul.
Today, I confess to starting a new way of life.
And I've carved it
 in stones.

Stone Age

Insomnia.
It is raining.
The cat is curled up on the corner of the bed.  Asleep.
 I am not.
I have a few things on my mind.
I should not have eaten teriyaki last night.
Salty.
I am trying not to think about being thirsty.
No water after midnight.
It's only one.
Long way to go till I can drink water again.
Pretend I am lost in the desert.
The rain teases me.
Water. Water. Water.

The Titanic sailed one hundred years ago. 

On April 13th, the people aboard had no idea that on April 14th 

they would hit an iceberg.

Life is like that. Lots of icebergs.

One hundred years ago, yesterday, tomorrow-

we just never know what lurks beneath the surface.

One doesn't always know a kidney stone is there lurking in the body

until one feels the unmistakeable pain of that tiny rock moving down the ureter.

That something so small could cause so much pain is amazing to me.

Louise L. Hay, the holistic health guru, says in her book,  Heal Your Body,
 that kidney stones are "balls of unexpressed anger."
Gee. I didn't know I was so angry.
I've lost count of how many kidney stones I've had in my life time.
My first was thirty-five years ago when I was eighteen.
I'm having lithotripsy at eleven in the morning to dissolve all that "unexpressed anger. "
To pulverize it with up to 300 electrical shocks to my kidney.
I think therapy is less painful
but I guess calcium is harder to crack than the psyche.

An iceberg sank the Titanic.
A tiny stone can bring you to your knees. Ask Goliath.
Or me.
None of us is unsinkable.

Water.

The Missed Deadline

I missed it.  The deadline.

As hard as I tried to meet it, my body simply would not cooperate. 

Why I thought I could rush my recovery is something I now am pondering. 

 It has only been one week since my surgery.  Monday a week ago. 

 Last Tuesday was one of the most physically painful days of my life - next to labor. 

But with labor, there was a prize at the end.  

This pain birthed little jagged stone fragments from a 9 mm kidney stone that my urologist broke up with a laser on Monday. I spent Wednesday pounding water, and languishing in bed on Vicodin which did little to relieve the pain.  

And still that deadline loomed. I had to make it back to school by Friday.

 I called the doctor and begged him to remove the stent from my right ureter so that I could return to school.  

"You see," I explained,  "I have this deadline to meet."

 Reluctantly, he agreed. However it was a lot sooner than he would prefer.  By about two weeks. He cautioned me that I would likely experience some pain.  I doubted the pain could be any worse than it was with the stent. 

So Thursday, I pulled myself up and dressed. Even slapped on some makeup with the intent of going directly from the doctor's office to school.  Wrong. 

 The pain I experienced after the stent removal was excruciating. My husband drove me back home and I popped 2 Vicodins and writhed in pain.  Friday was almost here and I was still in pain. 

 Everyone told me to let it go.  To stay home and recover.  That is what extensions are for.

But how could I? 

 I don't miss deadlines.  

And I don't let my students miss deadlines.  

I still thought I'd make it Friday. Until Friday morning. Then I thought that maybe I could make it by Friday afternoon. 

 Letting that deadline go was almost as painful as passing the kidney stones.

So I missed the deadline. 

A deadline I set. Months ago. I pounded that deadline into the heads my students.  

I posted it on my bulletin board and wrote it on my white board. 

And I missed it. Not them.  Me.

Schedules are very important to me.  I rule my life by them.  Rehearsal schedules. Syllabi. Calendars. 

I pride myself in their accuracy. I feel immense satisfaction when I can put a little check mark next to a date and task that was scheduled - done. 

Schedules  provide a road map that when followed ensure that the destination will be met.  

Schedules carve out time to accomplish tasks.  

In my world, I am lost without a schedule. 

A missed deadline wreaks havoc on a schedule.

Now, I have to alter my schedule and make up for the missed deadline.

 I have to find time to do what should have happened on Friday.

There is much for me to learn from this experience.  

Lesson Learned.  You cannot rush your recovery from surgery. 

Lesson Learned. You should not rush your recovery from surgery.

Lesson Learned. Listen to your doctor. 

Lesson Learned. Listen to your body. 

Lesson Learned.  Sometimes, we get thrown off our schedule.  That's when we need to be flexible.

Lesson Learned.  Missing a deadline is not the worst thing in the world.

February's Lessons

I've been away from this for a while.  February has been one of those months.  A strange convergence of various medical issues left me, for the most part,  in bed.  Pretty sick.  Felt lousy. No, I felt like I was going to die. That is not an exaggeration.

 A sinus infection kicked off the month just before my birthday. Plans canceled, I took my antibiotic and  pushed on with what could only be described as sinuses that felt like they were on fire. Refusing to give in to my burning sinuses,  I drug myself to rehearsal and class ignoring the deep, rumbling cough  and fatigue that o'erwhelmed me.  Chest Xray. Diagnosis - Pneumonia.  Further tests - Dehydration. Fever. Aches. Chills.  Kidney infection. CT Scan.  A 9 mm kidney stone obstructing my right ureter. And, by the way, both kidneys look like a kidney stone quarry.  Multiple stones of varying sizes just waiting their turn to make my life miserable.
I've had a long history of kidney stones.  This may be my twentieth or so.  I've lost count. They started when I was eighteen. I gave birth to both of my children and both times ended up back in the hospital the next week giving birth again - to stones.

Suffice it to say, I do not take calcium supplements.

So there I was, back in my old urologist's office - feeling strangely at home.  A little emotional even.  I'd arrived there after a slight detour to another doctor whose bedside manner was too gruff for my liking and whose schedule could not fit me in for lithotripsy for a month.  I've had lithotripsy before - twice to be exact.  The idea that I would have to walk around with pain in my right flank and a whopping 9 mm stone stuck in my ureter for a month did not sit well with me.
So I returned to the familiar world of my former urologist - who, upon looking at my Xray on Friday, scheduled me for surgery on Monday.  Boom. Done. Handled. I wanted to hug him.

Sitting in the examining room, I thought about the rocky road that had led me to his office.  And I thought about how important it is to be your own health advocate.

 Lesson learned.  All doctors are not equal.  You need to be assertive. Question.  Push.  Don't be brushed aside. Don't be passive.
And if your gut tells you that this isn't the doctor for you - find a different doctor.

I have been blessed with mostly good health.  This is, after all, not cancer. They're kidney stones.  But they can lead to complications - including the infection I had that was, apparently, the cause of my fever, chills, and aches.

Lesson learned.  Pay attention to your body. I thought maybe I had the flu. So did the nurse practitioner I saw first.  I thought the chills and body aches were being caused by the pneumonia.

Lesson learned.  Pay attention to fevers and body ache.  The nurse practitioner would not have given me a urine test had I not asked if I was dehydrated.  This led to the discovery of my infection which led to me wondering what could be causing the infection - which led me to insist that they check for a kidney stone. Why? Because of my health history.

Lesson learned.  Pay attention to your health history.

I battled my own denial.  Am I being overly cautious? Am I being a hypochondriac? Am I imagining that I feel this pain in my right kidney?  I must have taken fifteen hot baths to relieve my body ache and to stop me from shivering uncontrollably with the chills - but was I really that sick?

Lesson learned.  When in doubt - check it out. The urologist told me I had dodged a bullet. Could have been septic which is life threatening.  This was no joke.

It would be cavalier of me not to reflect on the lessons of this past month.  I am, honestly, a bit mad at myself for not checking for the kidney stone sooner.  The nurse practitioner said that they match the tests to the symptoms.

Lesson learned.  Tell your doctor all of your symptoms.

I have been forced to face my own limitations.  I have a demanding job and I work long hours.  I need to face the facts that my own driving desire for perfection is hazardous to my health.   And I am responsible for taking care of myself.

Lesson learned. Do not ignore your own health.

I have written about denial before.  In fact I have written an entire memoir about the disastrous consequences of denial.   I believe that a human being's capacity for denial is possibly as strong as the capacity for love.  In fact the two are often confused. The Greeks knew this - hence the corner stone of all tragedy, Oedipus.

 As a wise counselor once told me,  "You say, I'm not drowning. I'm swimming."

Lesson learned.  Face the truth of your life. Own it.
Denial can be deadly.