Bad Night

Today is going to be a rough day. It's pretty easy to realize this right now, at 5:12 AM, by the simple fact that I am awake. It would be nice if I was awake for some exciting thing - like getting up to go off to the airport on a trip (which will be happening a week from tomorrow) - but that's not the case this morning (or night? it still feels like night). Tonight was a bad night. I got to sleep alright, albeit at about 2:00 AM, but around 3:00 AM (just an hour later?) I was woken up. First it seemed my bladder had done the waking up but within minutes it was clear that my bladder was not at the top of my list of concerns as horrible abdominal pain started up. Despite the horrible pain, I managed to get up, stumble around to grab my IV bag (figures I'd choose to do my infusion overnight tonight), and make my way to the bathroom to empty my bladder. That didn't help the pain at all but it at least took my mind off of that concern. The pain was horrible. I dealt with gallbladder attacks for about a month and a half before finally getting my gallbladder out in November 2002 and that's the worst pain I've ever had, at least during the worst attacks. This pain was as bad as that. I managed to grab my heating pad and get back into bed but couldn't manage to get any relief or find a position that would minimize the pain. Writhing around in bed at 3:00 AM is really not my idea of a "good" night.

Thankfully, after about 10 or 15 minutes of this (with questions flashing through my head, including wondering if I should a) wake my parents up and/or b) prepare myself for a visit to the ER) the pain started to subside and eventually got down to an okay level. With my heating pad still on my belly, I managed to drift off to sleep only to be woken up about 15 minutes later with round 2. I went through the same thing - writhing around in bed a bit, whimpering or moaning quietly, trying desparately to find a position that would help but not finding any relief. It lasted about the same amount of time as the first round of it and then subsided and I drifted off to sleep briefly again. And then, yep, you guessed it, round 3 started around 3:30 AM (or sometime near there - I wasn't keeping careful watch on the clock during all this). Same thing as rounds 1 and 2 but with each reoccurrance of the pain, I became more and more worried and came closer and closer to throwing up into my handy "barf bucket" that I keep by my bed (I've never actually thrown up into it, so it's not gross or anything).

By round 3, I decided that if it kept happening or if I started throwing up, I would have to wake up my parents and decide whether or not a trip to the ER would be necessary. Thankfully, it seems that things do come in three's as I haven't had a worsening of the pain since the third round let up. I've been awake since then, though, half worried the pain will come back and half wanting to look things up online to try to figure out WHAT could be causing the pain. At least back when I was having gallbladder attacks (or at least towards the end of when I was having them) I knew what was causing the pain (and earlier on could at least have a pretty good suspicion of what was going on since I was on an IV antibiotic that is known to cause gallstones). But this time around, I really don't know what could be causing the severe pain. The location of the pain isn't much help - pretty much in my upper abdomin but localized on either side of my belly button (but a little above it). I feel like, when the pain was happening, I could have drawn two circles of where the pain was, one on each side of my abdomin.

I was trying to run through the possible causes in my head - kidney problems seemed possible but that's mainly felt on the sides and in the back; I looked up information about the early signs of appendicitis but the kind of pain doesn't really fit (and I'd have to wait until it moved to be more localized in the lower right part of my abdomin before I'd be able to seriously consider this); it could be something in my bile duct since the pain is similar to my gallbladder attacks, but I don't know what would have caused that; or it could be something with my intestines which is likely since I now have an official diagnosis of a motility disorder (although my diagnosis is of gastroparesis which is focused on the stomach). Whatever it is (or was), it will most likely be the cause of a rough day ahead. Going on an hour of sleep for me is just setting me up for a huge crash.

Everytime something like this happens - when I have a rough night because of one symptom or another or when a new, bad symptom pops up - I wonder if it's a "normal" thing that I'm experiencing or if it has something to do with my myriad of health problems. Do "normal" (and by "normal" I mean "healthy") people sometimes wake up in the middle of the night with severe, intermittant abdominal pain? Would a "healthy" person head for the ER at the first sign of severe pain? Or would they wait it out like I did? Have my constant health problems made me less likely to seek medical attention when something bad starts up because I just think it's nothing, or will go away on its own, or just want to make sure it's really serious before heading for the hospital? I wonder, if I were "healthy" and I spent the night the way I spent this (last?) night, what would my response have been?

I guess when your life is more or less ruled by medical issues, diseases, treatments, and testing, you are changed in more ways than might be generally noticed. You're changed, not just in how you see the world or how you spend your days, but you view potentially bad (health) situations as something to just "wait and see" about. I'm rambling a bit now, but afterall it's 5:40 AM now and I'm going on an hour and a few winks of sleep. Perhaps it is time for me to try to get back to sleep for at least a little while. Hopefully the pain won't come back (although right now there's a low-level of pain, but it's managable) and the rest of my day won't be too bad. I fear that one bad night will have a domino effect and cause a bad week...or even longer. But for now I'll just focus on getting through the night...err...I just looked outside and it's officially morning - the sun is up - not something I was hoping to see today (dawn, that is) but perhaps it will be calming to experience this time of day once in a while.

Sleepily yours,
Penguini