My Weekend

Nephrolithiasis. Sounds like a former Roman emperor, right?

Nope. This is one of the clinical terms for having kidney stones.

Back in 2002, I passed one of these little bastards in the ER. The ER? Well, yeah, you see…for those that have never had one…this is a really painful process. You’re “passing” a rock from your kidney to your bladder and then you “pass” it from your bladder to whatever you use to catch piss to prevent it from landing on your floor.

I have to take a pause here to point out that “pass” is such a light term to use for this process. The pain involved ranks above “pass”. It’s more like a forcible ejection. The stone is like a belligerent drunk getting kicked out of a club…only he doesn’t want to leave. So, he scrapes and claws at everything he can on his way out.

For me, the most painful leg of the stone’s journey is from the kidney to the bladder. Mostly it feels like a muscle spasm. Sometimes, more like a knifing.

This weekend I’ve been enjoying the latter stages of forcible ejection. Kidney to bladder wasn’t too bad this time, I woke up thinking that I had slept wrong. An hour later, I got that funny feeling like I had a small blockage…yeah, that feels like sitting on your sack, guys. That’s when I knew I’d be having another stone soon.

Something that isn’t taught in public schools about kidney stones…once you have one…you’ll have more. You’re a lifer. So, once the first stone drops, the quarry is open for business.

There are plenty of things that you can do to prevent them. Cranberry juice is a fan favorite. I like mine with a little Grey Goose…but, that messes with my acid reflux. So, mostly I stick with drinking about half a gallon of water a day. This works, for the most part. I haven’t had a stone in almost a year.

Here’s what the last one looked like:















I passed this little jewel at work. It actually came out in TWO parts. The other chunk is lost for ever. I was standing there peeing and praying to the Almighty that I'd finally pass the geoad that I'd been carrying around on hold for 5 days. And then it happened. Actually moving the stone through the urinary tract doesn't register until those final few inches, then...well, I'm not sure how to describe it exactly...except like your dick is vomiting...minus the dry heaves, burning throat, and abdominal cramping. Graphic, I know, but there really isn't anything in my frame of reference that I can use that's similar. Anyway, so my cock shoots out the first bit of shale that shakes me so bad that my aim goes high and I literally bounce it off the rim and it lands on the floor. His brother came out with much less aggravation and a small splash. I let him go, but the other one got washed off and shown around the office.

That’s right, I keep them. Gross you say? Why shouldn’t I keep them? Anything I worked that hard to produce ain’t getting flushed down the shitter. Besides, the wife has always wanted a rock garden, this way will save me the trip to Lowes.

In conclusion…as I sit here and patiently await the birth of yet another present from the seven dwarves working the mine in my kidney, I ask you for a moment of silence for my Colts who couldn’t turn it around today and got beaten by the Steelers. Flashbacks of ’95 still haunt our fair city.