Thursday, August 1, 2013

What is wrong

Before going full on with scans and specialists (which are being arranged nonetheless) I went back to my GP on tuesday as she had asked me to let her know how things were. I wasn't feeling really any better, nausea on and off, I started keeping a diary so I knew at times I was feeling fine and at times I wasn't. I also had occasional pain on my left hand side, nothing major, more of a nagging feeling which was only exacerbating my anxiety. She visited me again, asked a bit more about symptoms etc. and did a quick urine stick test. Well, it came back with very high white blood cells and a little bit of blood too. A UTI!! Without the classic acute presentation. She said it can be that it presents with an overall feeling of queasiness. So off the urine went to be tested properly and I went in the following morning for a blood test screening for kidney, liver and thyroid function as well as full blood count and other inflammatory values. I rang my doctor friend and let him know the progress, his wife, also a consultant, works in the hospital were the blood and urine were analysed and he said she would find out for me the results asap. This morning he called me with the good news that bloods came back absolutely normal but that the lab confirmed high levels of white blood cells in the urine (no traces of blood). They are culturing them now and we'll know in a couple of days if anything grows and what can we do to treat it.
I feel relieved to say the least. Of course I started immediately all the home remedies (drinking plenty and taking cranberry juice) and hopefully I'll start feeling better even before the cultures come back. I'm also glad that it wasn't just in my head to be honest.

Interestingly, I read today that oxytocin normally associated with pleasure and released during breastfeeding, has been found in some cases to be linked with worsening anxiety which appears to be my case... ah well. I have to get back into meditation but it's not easy when things are tough.

A post for another time but our bedtime routine is back to Hell zone  which is very stressfull...

Thank you so much for bearing with me. Will update with next results.

2 comments:

Valery said...

oh darn, a UTI.
How nasty, I can only imagine how bad you must feel. Can you combine antibiotics with breastfeeding? For me I just get sleepy from breastfeeding, I don't feel any magic pleasure from it either (well maybe just enough to overcome my aversion to anyone touching my nipples)
My uti home remedy also includes taking vitamin C tablets for helping to increase the acidity in the bladder, probably not needing if you already take cranberries though, just easier/cheaper maybe.
Take care.
(and so sorry about the bed time routine)

Mina said...

The summer makes bed time routine harder, too much light and too hot (although I do not complain aout being hot, we've had such a long and hard winter)... Hopefully it will get better soon.
Hope too that the results are ok, and that you are better very soon.
Take care!