What You Didn't Want to Know About Stents

Seems life is interesting after getting a kidney stone removed. Mine was stuck in the ureter. The piece between the kidney and the bladder. Sucker wasn't going to move. Lodged in nice and tight. What a pain. Literally.

My decision was to have surgery and have it removed. I cannot express the kind of pain I have been in off and on for the last 2 months. And I wanted to do anything to get rid of it. If you have a queezy stomach, read no further.

The rest is after the 'More Pawprints'

Then I found out that I had a stent put in to help with any 'pieces' that might come out. I had no idea what a stent was... and it took everything in my power not to take a picture of the string coming out of my urethra and taped to my belly.

Being overweight, with a stretched out belly... did not help anything. You really, really don't want to pull that string. And the first day... My body actually decided it didn't want to pee. Yaa, my bladder was full, it was begging to be relieved and I wasn't able to go. No joke. It hurt that bad. Only for the first day, Friday. And I did go. And I drank even MORE water. Really. I knew it was going to help in the long run. Also, all pain will end eventually.

Didn't think much more of it. It got less painful each day. Only when that darn string got pulled did I notice it on the last day.

Time to have the stent removed. I'm a chicken. A big chicken. I went in and asked about it. The nurse said they just yank it out. Gulp. Ok. And she did. It hurt but not as bad as the kidney stone. Hmmm. She showed it to me. I almost fainted. Sucker was about 9 inches long. I found a picture of one... forgot to bring my camera to get a picture of it...

See those curled ends? One is stuck in your kidney, the other is stuck in your bladder. Those little holes help with the urination getting through. Yaa... I can't help but ask questions. The string is attached on the curled side in your bladder.

Not something I wish to do anytime soon. Actually I n.e.v.e.r want to go through that process again. At least childbirth gave me a child.

Enough... I'm alive. Still not quite up to speed... seems I don't react well to stents and surgery. Silly thing like a fever that won't go away and some pain left. Sigh. Just a little longer and all should be healed... or I get to have better antibiotics! Luckily, most of the blood in the urine is gone. Nothing like it has been for the last couple of days. See, things are getting better already.

Thanks again to everyone for their prayers and wonderful good thoughts... it certainly helped.