Me and my Super Kidney

Okay so it's not super per se, but I've got a kidney with a double collection chamber - apparently. While THAT is not quite interesting the story of how I came to find out a had a double duty kidney makes for some serious soap opera-esque drama.

It all began when I ran 10 miles training for the Montgomery half-marathon. After I finished I started having major issues with my bladder. As silly as that sounds - it's totally true and was very annoying. I, who even when pregnant had no problems with leakage was suddenly seriously considering an investment in Depends the next time I visited the commissary. After several days of having these issues, I went to the doctor to see if I could have possibly stressed out my bladder with all of my running or if it might be the onset of a UTI. They took me in for a urinalysis and when the doctor came back in he told me he had absolutely no idea what was wrong with me and asked me to diagnose myself.

Now this may surprise some of you non-military folks out there, but based on my experience with military doctors, this irritated, but did not shock me. I told him I had no idea what was wrong which was why I came in - "Could I have stressed out my bladder with running? Could I be getting a UTI?" His answer: "Hmmm....well there was a little blood in your urine, I'll give you some antibiotics and we'll check you again next week." Not at all satisfied with this diagnosis, I went home feeling like I was exactly where I was when I started out this morning, except now I had antibiotics for a UTI, I may or may not have. I finished the antibiotics, had a visit from my Aunt Ruby and then went in to do another urinalysis. Not hearing anything for a few days, I decided to ask at my scheduled Pap about my test results.

 This is where it gets interesting. I saw another doctor for my pap and when she asked me about spotting between periods, I answered in the affirmitive as I always spot during ovulation....especially since having a baby. No big deal - all of my other gynocologists including the one who delivered Elise have told me "You're a bleeder." When I asked her if my urianlysis results were back she suddenly panicked and said "There's blood in your urine AND you are spotting??? There's something SERIOUSLY wrong with you." Now let me just interject here that I am a nervous person by nature. I have spent many years combating my anxiety and I have managed to keep it under control through exercise, decluttering my life, and staying away from things like caffeine that just add fuel to the fire. The statement made by the doctor - while my husband is deployed, my family is 14 hours away and my daughter is only a year old, unnerved me just a tad. She tested me for STDs, did blood tests, more urinalysis and scheduled an ultra sound of my kidney, bladder and ovaries.

Not only were all of these tests and subsequent results scheduled weeks apart, they pulled me off of exercise so I had no outlet for my stress and anxiety. After I don't know how many pee in a cup tests that came back abnormal and blood tests which came back normal, I finally had my ultrasound. The technician couldn't tell me anything, of course, but he did go over my left kidney more extensively than the right....meaning that he had me turn on my side when examining my left where he didnt ask me to do so on the right. He told me that if they found anything that needed to be taken care of immediately they would call me Monday (this was a Friday) at the latest, Wednesday for anything abnormal. I got a call Thursday morning. The conversation went something like this:

Nurse: Ms. Clayson, do you have an appointment scheduled with the urologist yet?
Me: No, I was told at my last appointment that I needed to wait for the referral from Tricare - they told me if it was super serious they would have already made me an appointment.
Nurse: Yes, that's true. There is an abnormality on your kidney.
 Me: (Anxiety mounting) What is it, what's wrong?
 Nurse: You appear to have a dual collection chamber in your left kidney.
Me: Is that serious? What does that mean?
Nurse: Oh, no nothing serious, just unusual. Just thought you might like to share that with the urologist.

Now, here I am almost a year later finishing this blog I never posted. After this, I breathed a much needed sigh of relief, but all of that stress and anxiety took it's toll on my body. You're stressed enough when your spouse is deployed...moreso when you have children (no matter how good they are - being a single parent is TOUGH). Add to that stress worries about your own health and well being and fears of your child's well being should something happen to you or your spouse while he is deployed and it makes for a very nasty nasty situation. I lost almost 30 pounds in less than 2 months. I went home to PA for a reprieve and started feeling like myself again, until I came home 10 days before Erick was scheduled to fly in. (He thankfully, got off of his deployment 5 months early). Twenty-fours hours after being home, panic attacks started again and I dropped all the weight I had gained during my month's stay in PA and then some. After Erick came home, I was still struggling to keep weight on and my anxiety was still very high...mostly because I was so very thin and it worried me. I went back in to see the doctor - hoping she would just tell me it was stress and maybe give me some tips or advice to help me center myself again - but instead she scheduled me for a CAT scan to check for masses. I left that appointment, like so many before it, in tears. How in the heck did I get here? I did the CAT scan - normal. I talked to a therapist who told me I was more than justified to be having all of these anxiety issues after all the crap and stress I had been through. She wanted to put me on medication, I refused. I wanted to do this naturally, like I did before. She gave me some relaxation exercises, gave me some homework to do before bed each night (I wasn't sleeping so I had to go through relaxation exercises each night, but the best medicine for me, was the Disney Cruise. Erick and I had scheduled that when we found out he was coming home early - it was scheduled for a week after my appointment with the therapist.

 Now I think it's awful that my best medicine was the cruise and not reading my scriptures or listening to a conference talk. Those helped...believe me they helped. But I needed to get away and have absolutely nothing to worry about. The cruise answered that. Meals were taken care of, beds were made, Erick took the lion's share of the responsibility of watching Elise (which was good for them to bond after deployment anyway) and I was able to relax - truly relax - after 8 months of being a single parent, handling Elise's illnesses and my own, being a pin cushion for the doctors at the clinic and worrying about the safety of my husband, I was able to just sit back and do nothing. It was wonderful.