I know that I’m way overdue giving you this update but between having a scan, waiting to see the doc and the actual results, coupled with Coronavirus, there has been a lot going on.
The last update I gave you was after I’d finally managed to get through a colonoscopy successfully! Third time was definitely a charm on that one.
Well, I trundled through Christmas and New Year waiting for a letter confirming the outcome of the colonoscopy and what would happen next. With everything that happened with my former work chum (see the Dealing with Anger post), it wasn’t at the forefront of my mind.
By 21 January, I was fed up with waiting. I phoned the secretary of the gastroenterologist who had originally referred me for the colonoscopy. She said that I should have had a letter and that letter stated that because nothing sinister was found, I was being discharged from his clinic and, basically, it was something that I would have live with. Are you absolutely kidding me? Live with this? Not a fucking hope. Oh yes, I really want to live with not knowing when I’m next going to be in excrutiating pain for hours, vomiting like there’s no tomorrow and, potentially, collapsing. Yup, that really sounds like the way to live.
I booked an appointment with my GP. Thankfully, at that time, only a 10 day wait. I saw my GP and he said that he would refer me for an ultrasound (just about the only scan I haven’t had) and some more blood tests, just purely liver function tests. That came through to go on 11 February, the day after my chum’s funeral. At least it was going to be soon. It couldn’t come soon enough. Between seeing my GP and getting to the hospital for the scan, I had two really quite nasty episodes and was really getting very down about the whole thing. I really hoped that they could find something.
Jill came to the hospital with me. We were early so I thought I’d see what the queue was like for blood tests and see if I could get mine done before my scan appointment. We walked into the blood test room and you have to take a ticket like the deli counter at Tesco. My ticket number was 458 and I looked up on the board and the previous number called was 456. Touch. We literally didn’t get a chance to sit down. Literally, as soon as I parked my backside on a chair, my number came up. In and out in seconds. A great nurse who managed to get a vein straight away and I absolutely didn’t feel a thing. To be fair, I have no problem with blood tests being done, I’m not worried about needles at all.
So, it was straight out of the blood test room and onto the Imaging Department. Checked in straight away and was told which waiting area to go to. Again, we barely had a chance to get our backsides on to the seats and I was called in to the scan room.
The Radiologist was quite young but was training a proper newbie so I was getting the full once over. He had my lying on my back and on both sides. He was really getting stuck in and I was starting to get a little worried that he had found something. He then asks me if anyone has ever spoken to me about my kidneys. My kidneys? WTF? What’s wrong with my kidneys? Mini freak out on the way! He said it was nothing, just that my left kidney was a lot bigger than my right kidney. WHAT?!!! What does that mean? Is there a problem? Is it inflamed? What’s happening? Apparently, it happens and it is just an anatomical anomaly that he found curious as he’d never seen it in real life before. Okay, son, well now that you’ve finished scaring the crap out of me, you can take your curiosity about my anatomical anomaly and shove it where the sun don’t shine!! Have you found anything that explains why I get so sick?
Yup. I’ve got gallstones. A whole bag of marbles in there apparently and when they get stuck, that’s when I get sick. Finally, a diagnosis. You have no idea how happy I was to learn that I have gallstones. Thank God. He said that he would send the report back to my GP and my GP could take it from there for an onward referral. I could have kissed him, I was so happy. Everything else is absolutely normal, no worries, nothing sinister. I just have gallstones.
I went back to the waiting room and immediately told Jill the good news (and about my big kidney) and she was thrilled too. We said it felt very odd to be so happy about something that is still quite serious and will require some sort of surgery, be it just zapping the stones or taking the whole gall bladder out. But, gallstones was the best news we could have hoped for given my symptoms, and we were running with that!
A further update will follow once the doctor has been seen and what happens next. A happy day that all I have is gallstones.
Living The BPD Life 