Okay so maybe my weird arse dream on Thursday night was trying to tell me something other than the fact that discussions about miscarriage seems entirely inappropriate amongst strangers…. 😐
I have PCOS (Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome) and have had more than my share of girly swot problems over the years including insulin resistance, infertility and disastrous…. and I mean truly fucking painful and heinous… periods. So I tend to ignore as much of it as I can. Which is a policy that has NOT held me in good stead on this occasion.
Having not had a cycle since… ohh… February I think… I was not surprised when my next cycle did finally start in early July that it was not exactly "pleasant" MASSIVE UNDERSTATEMENT !!! I should probably have investigated it earlier than August when it still hadn’t decided to stop, but like a silly little bint, I thought I knew what was going on so just asked my GP to start me back on the pill again. Which I did… to no effect whatsoever… it just kept coming and going and going and coming… for about 8 weeks in total.
Until yesterday afternoon about 4.30pm when I started to have abdominal pain. Which is nothing new to me because of the aforementioned girly swot issues. So I did my usual: take two Digesic, have a lie down. No help there. Grab a heat pack and a cuppa tea a bit later trying to ignore it. Still no improvement. Another couple of Digesics, reheat the heatpacks, a couple of Tramadol and a movie for distraction and by 9.30pm I was experiencing severe abdominal pain that was not abating and was fast reaching a point where it was beyond my ability to tolerate.
This was without doubt the worst abdominal pain I have ever experienced… worse than post operative pain from two laparoscopies, worse than a golden staph infection in the umbillicus, worse than any of my 9 or 10 TVEPUs (Trans Vaginal Egg Pick Ups on IVF) worse than pain from having my ovaries drilled then electocauterized and definitely worse than the post operative pain from a c-section delivery which I once described as ‘a mild abdominal discomfort’.
By the time I agreed to be taken to the hospital at about 10pm, I was doubled over clutching my abdomen, grimacing and swearing constantly. By the time I got to the hospital, I couldn’t sit or lay down in anyway that helped alleviate the pain, I was literally writing in pain on the hospital bed, sweating with the effort of trying not to scream and was gritting my teeth, trying not to cry (failed at that a bit I think).
The hospital admissions people rushed me in… thank God. I don’t know what I would have done if I’d been left in the waiting room. They took as complete a medical history as I was able to offer in that state (no easy task given my convoluted gynaecological history) and did some blood tests, gave me some IV morphine that I initially resisted but eventually agreed to take in desperation. The morphine worked quick and helped ease the pain considerably. I got a second shot of morphine and the pain levels dropped from ‘unbearable’ to ‘what abdominal pain?’ in mere minutes. (Strangely enough… the morphine kicked in and the abdominal pain disappeared but did nothing to dull my regular back pain which was still present… weird fucked up nervous system). I had a pelvic exam (never fun) and then they wanted a urine sample so I went to the bathroom and (how do you put this delicately?!?!?) passed a largish amount of ‘endometrial tissue’…. which was probably the remains of a miscarriage that my body had been trying to expell for some weeks. Not fun.
Almost immediately I felt better Yes I know. I know. I shouldn’t have ignored the problem. I should have gone off to see the OB/GYN weeks ago which would no doubt have resulted in a controlled and clinical D&C instead. Sigh.
We live and learn…. or at least that’s the plan.
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