It's Kidney Stones!

Monday before last, I woke up at 2 am to go to the bathroom. This is the first time I can ever remember waking up from my sleep because I had to pee. I went back to bed and woke up at my normal time for the day. When I went to the bathroom then, I was struck with such a pain that it sent me running back to my bed. My entire left side was in searing pain, and I couldn't get control of it.

I had a kind of important work project to tend to that day, so I sent an e-mail to my work saying I wasn't feeling so hot but I'd rally and be into work in a few hours.

Well, a few hours later I was in the emergency room of George Washington Hospital being diagnosed with a kidney stone, my first ever.

I only went to the emergency room after the doctor at urgent care said she couldn't determine what was wrong with me; based on the location of my pain, she thought it was my liver. Later, I asked a PA at GW where my liver is. It's mainly on the OPPOSITE side of my body.

I called my dad as I walked from the doctor's office north of Dupont Circle to Foggy Bottom. He didn't answer. Bradley was the first to find out what happened via the above picture that I tweeted as I was being discharged from the hospital. He bbm'd me: jillabean? are you ok? You might want to call Mum. Later, he asked if I got so excited about my impeding trip to California later that week for his graduation that my kidneys malfunctioned.

That's exactly what happened.

I eventually passed the stone sometime on Tuesday afternoon, but I wasn't able to catch it. Such a waste of the cute little specimen jar they gave me at the hospital.

Oh, and if you were wondering what the pain feels like, it's like Joey's reaction in that Friends episode times about 10. And I got morphine at the hospital!