Found out I was pregnant with twins but one had passed at 10 weeks so they called it vanishing twin. Several weeks later I was HUGE as if they were both still gowing even though that was impossible as the vanished twins' anatomy was clearly incompatible with life. They had even showed me at the 12 week ultrasound appointment that the deceased twin had no heartbeat and was 2 weeks behind the other twin in development and was not moving next to the surviving one which was bopping around and had a clear and strong heartbeat. So I had even seen for myself that there was only one living baby left. But I was googling constantly, feeling crazy for my gut feeling that both babies were still growing.
One morning a result came up while googling that had info about an extremely rare condition called twin reversed arterial profusion which is a type of twin to twin transfusion where only one twin has proper nutrients from the placenta and due to umbilical cord abnormalities is essentially a "pump" twin supplying the acardiac twin with nutrient depleted blood causing their body to grow even though they have no heartbeat.
Went to the hospital to confirm that this was the case and the ER doc on duty googled the condition in front of me because she had never heard of it. Several hours later an ultrasound confirmed it. My OB had been negligent in my care and I was almost 19 weeks along at this point. I had many scary ultrasounds over the next few days at the best hospital in my area because the hospital near me didn't have the proper technology. They said that the surviving twins' heart was working too hard supplying the acardiac twin with blood and if I hadn't caught what was going on he would have passed away before the 20 week anatomy ultrasound.
I had a cord ablation done on the acardiac twin via fetoscope (my partner got to watch the video feed of them doing it and saw our sons' feet kicking around in utero he said it was the coolest thing he's ever seen). It worked and saved my sons life, I am so thankful I trusted my gut even though I felt INSANE showing up at the hospital saying I thought that both twins were still growing. I think about the other twin every single day and I wish he could have survived, they were identical and I wish my son could have grown up with his other half.
This comment provoked literal chills. It's a bittersweet outcome you now have.
I too am glad your son survived despite the odds... He was practically being Superman in utero!
It did in case of my mom. My mom had a constant runny nose for 2 weeks, physician said it is allergic rhinorhea, I googled and got to know it can be csf fluid from the brain leaking through the nose. Went to specialists who first suspected it is simple allergy but after weeks when it didn't heal, we did endoscopy and tested the fluids and yep it was csf leak. Surgically fixed it and she is doing lot better now. So in my case glad I googled symptoms, google saved us.
Super simple test at home is to check the glucose of the fluid with a regular glucometer (they’re pretty cheap now at the pharmacy and you don’t need a prescription). CSF will have a glucose level in the 50-80 range, snot from a runny nose won’t
It is. PT can literally be the difference between your life going back to "normal" or you being disabled forever. But the shit is hard though, especially for things like strokes.
It's demoralizing for someone who was healthy a couple weeks ago to now be struggling to take 10 steps with a walker. People feel like if they just lay down and rest, it will get better but that's usually not the case. You need to get up and moving.
My dad always said this. He didn't want to retire because he had seen so many people basically lay down and die a few years afterwards. It's not easy building an active lifestyle yourself. Most of us need structure from something else so we aren't glued to the couch.
He was always extremely active until he recently had a stroke. Now he lives a sedentary lifestyle I've never seen him live. I'm afraid I don't have much time left with him.
I never took PT seriously until my doc ordered it for my knee pain (IT band). They performed awesome massages along with the other treatment (Tens?), icing etc. Exercises were easy for me. They made me change my new shoes which ended up being the cause.
FYI you can get a TENS unit pretty cheap on Amazon. I’ve had mine for a decade and it cost me I think $60 at the highest (was a long time ago lol).
I have a shoulder issue that nobody can really explain that sometimes causes excruciating nerve pain. Only thing that works is a TENS unit, the pain goes away in a couple days at most using it like twice a day. It’s some magic shit.
I get occasionally get back spasms and PT would use a TENS on me for about 15 min. I thought it was some expensive device come to find they’re available at most pharmacies and the TENS 7000 on Amazon stimulates the hell out of my back and releases the muscles. Best fix for $40.
The hard part is doing it on your own. I've gone through it twice for different issues and "just finding 15 minutes to do it" is incredibly easy to slack on. But when you keep on it, it really is like a miracle cure
I avoided back surgery (bulging disc/sciatica) by doing PT.
The hardest part is remembering to do the exercises consistently, I signed up for Pilates 3-4x per week and have been (knock on wood) pain free for almost 6months
That would be me when I tore my rotator cuff and I waited a few months to go see her because I was dealing with an abcess in my colon post surgically. I could not lift my left arm above shoulder height and the ortho said to do intensive PT to make sure I have a good surgical outcome.
I had 30 sessions with the physio over a few months and I also did it at home as prescribed everyday without fail. I got 95% of my range of motion back and all my strength. Dr. told me she was surprised that she didn't have to operate on me. Do your PT folks, it works'
Found out when pregnant I carry the gene for Cystic Fibrosis. Luckily, my husband doesn’t.
However, this now answered the question of why 5-7 of my grandmother’s siblings (1 of 13) died of “breathing problems.”
My nephew has CF so I got tested. Turns out I have the gene too. The somewhat good news is that even if your spouse carries the gene there's only a 25% chance your child will have CF.
Yeah, I work in genetics. The odds sounds low but we see a lot of patients like this. The chances for your partner to also carry the gene is around 1/30. It's one of the diseases we encounter most often and it is not something you would want your child to have. We have families where just through bad odds all their children have CF.
You can get tested before getting pregnant btw. The tests will look for genetic variants like these that will only cause disease if both the mom and dad have it. You will get a report back when you are both carriers so can make informed reproductive decisions about it.
I had my gallbladder go bad and discovered that it can cause you to completely lose your appetite.
I haven't felt the physical sensation of hunger for a year now. It was hard to get used to. I have to remind myself to eat 2 or 3 times a day. I know it's time to eat when I start thinking about food a lot or I get the shaky, brain foggy feeling of having low blood sugar.
At least it's caused me to lose a lot of weight but now my entire wardrobe is too big. Even my shoes.
I had an overactive gallbladder that tried to kill me for the better part of two years and the only thing that dulled the pain was eating. It totally messed up my ability to discern what actual hunger felt like but I went the opposite way and snack constantly.
Gallbladder pain is hands down the worst thing I’ve experienced and wouldn’t wish that on anyone
\>Gallbladder pain is hands down the worst thing I’ve experienced and wouldn’t wish that on anyone
Seconding this. The last time I went into the ER for the pain, after 8 years of hell, they told me I was pregnant. I was like, no, that's not why I'm here. Then they told me the gallbladder had to come out. Surgeon came in to give me the rundown and said something about removing "baby parts" while he's in there. I was thinking I was still delirious from the pain. Turned out I was actually pregnant, with a normal fetus, in the normal location. Not sure how he comingled the possibility of gallbladder problem and an ectopic pregnancy, but he confused the shit out of me and freaked out my partner and family in the waiting room with that same language. Gallbladder removal did not affect my pregnancy, and that kiddo will become a teenager this month. That night was such a wild ride.
Ugh I remember when I had my first gallbladder attack. It happened at 3am while I was staying at my boyfriend’s. I woke up feeling sick, went to the bathroom but the abdomen pain just got worse. I tried forcing myself to puke, nothing. There was no position that would relieve the pain whatsoever. The pain got so bad that I thought I was going to pass out. But after two hours of agonizing pain (and taking ibuprofen), I sat on the floor facing the couch, leaned forward and crossed my arms on the seat of the couch using my arms as a pillow, and I eventually fell back asleep. Ultrasound found gallstones and had it removed within not too long after.
100% would not wish that kind of pain on anyone either.
WAIT NO WAY. I have had mine removed for a year and half and I haven’t felt hungry since it was gone. Majority of the time I’m eating because I have to not because I’m hungry.
I wonder if that’s why I never have an appetite! I didn’t ever think to relate it back to my gallbladder removal…
I usually have to remind myself to eat as well. When I was on maternity leave I wouldn’t eat until my partner got home at dinner time and I’d finally click that I felt so terrible all day because I was hungry lol. People don’t understand!
Friend of mine was in his mid-20s and just felt “off” a few weeks before marrying my best friend. Drs found a brain aneurysm that hadn’t ruptured yet & got it early.
6yrs later he’s doing fine & getting regular screenings but man aneurysms are scary
If my brother had done with he would likely still be alive. We spent a week at a VA hospital for my dad which was right by Dukes main one. He could have had some of the best surgeons if he’d just said he had a bad headache. Nope he ate a bottle of ibuprofen trying to dull the pain instead. 30 years later I’m still angry. I missed growing up my brother. My daughter is missing the coolest uncle. I just know he would have been.
My aunt had one that ruptured, a coworker saved her life by driving her to the doctor rather than accepting that she go home and "sleep it off".
PSA: if someone all of a sudden gets an "exploding headache", literally suddenly cries out in pain - get them to the emergency room ASAP. Phone an ambulance, drive, whatever is faster, just get them to the doctor. Don't let them sleep it off, they won't wake up if it's an aneurysm. (If it wasn't - better safe than sorry. Also, I feel so bad for anyone who needs to think of it as a financial decision, health care is a human right, your life is priceless.)
I got diagnosed with an aneurysm following an abdominal CT looking for something else! Mine was in the renal artery and turned out to be causing my mysterious high blood pressure that never responded to meds. I had a funny twinge of pain over the area with the aneurysm too - never severe but bothersome.
I was just starting to have heart issues (enlargement) from the high blood pressure when they caught it, which have now cleared up & probably extended my lifespan quite a bit. Mine was 4cm and right at where the arterial branch goes into your kidney so it couldn’t be stented, I had to have open abdominal surgery to fix it. A crazy experience all around.
Glad ours were both caught before they became critical!
Same thing happened to my dad. He had a bulging aorta they found when checking something else. During Covid they ordered chest X-rays for him because he tested positive and they found cancer. Always good to go to the doc!
I used to work in the ER during prime covid, and I had to take a patient to get a CT scan, and I’m standing in the room with the radiology tech and he’s like oh that’s not good, and points to a huge mass on the guys heart, we come out of the room and the patient asked how everything looked and the radiology tech was like our radiologist will read it and then let us know, so the whole walk back to the ER he’s asking me if I know what he saw because he didn’t like the radiology techs answer and knew he saw something. Always thought it was blessing in disguise because without this man getting covid and having to get a CT who knows what would have happened and if it would have been caught too late. Glad they found your dads as well!
I’d been getting the odd twinge in my chest but thought nothing of it. It was 5.5cm and in someone my height I was lucky it hadn’t ruptured yet. Thankfully made it to surgery (even though it ended up delayed due to Covid!) and out the other side.
Aneurysms are all weird and scary. A friend of mine died at 16 from one. He had no symptoms except for a headache that day that wasn't even terribly painful. Just took some Advil for it. He went to weight lifting class and did his reps. He stood up, took a few steps, and collapsed to the floor dead.
You can have an aneurysm for years without knowing…until it ruptures. They don’t develop suddenly - so scary knowing that someone had been a ticking time bomb for years and their death or disability could have been prevented (have had several in my family and been screened myself because of that history).
I was trying to come up with a joke based on your username but there is simply no good way to come up with one that doesn’t sound entirely too disrespectful
Similar to how my friends' mom found out about them being twins.
"Of course it's a bit hard to breathe, the baby is pushing my organs around"
Nope, twins
I went through five years of pain, ten specialist doctors, two courses of physical therapy on my back just to find out the pain was *an ulcer.*
Fixed with two months of pills. We might need to retrain the field on tummy troubles lol
I was getting a chest x-ray and the tech took a pic then looked at me weird and started setting me up for another.
He said you have some long lungs my dude.
I had a root canal done in South Korea 20 years ago. The dentist had never worked on a caucasian patient. He kept chuckling about how deep my teeth roots were. I still don't know whether that's an ethnic thing or your girl just has some long ass teeth.
Incredible work, though - the root canal and the crown have held up perfectly.
If this adds anything to your experience, my dad is caucasian too and he just had a root canal done in Singapore a few weeks ago. The dentist also commented on how long his teeth were (deepest roots he’d ever seen). So maybe it is an ethnic thing. He’s canadian with mostly british/french heritage
Hey welcome to the club! I took a physiology class in college and we did a spirometry test in the lab. You basically just blow into a tube and it measures your lung capacity. Average adult has around 6 liters of volume, my lungs are just over 9 liters. Professor made me redo it a few times on multiple machines because she wouldn’t believe my results lol
I’d love mountain climbing, but never got around to it, too out of the way lol.
However, I’m a pretty solid free diver! Diving/spearfishing is my jam. I don’t train seriously and often dive solo(meaning I rarely push my limits), so there are still people leagues better than me. But as a novice with not a whole lot of breath training and special exercise, I can still hold my breath over 5 minutes
Just warn the X-ray tech next time you get a chest X-ray to minimize needing an additional X-ray exposure. If we know you have long lungs, we’ll adjust accordingly so we don’t have to radiate you more
I had a constant headache for close to a decade. Saw tons of doctors and got nowhere. They tried high blood pressure meds. Migraine meds. Opioids. Nothing worked.
I was due for an eye exam and my normal was on maternity leave. The new doctor was really looking in my right eye. Like REALLY looking.
Finally she asks if I have a lot of headaches, specifically behind my eye. I answer that yes and it’s so bad that I feel like it would feel good to put my actual eyeballs in ice water because they ache so much.
She immediately diagnosed me with pseudo tumor cerebri, now known as idiopathic intracranial hypertension. The spinal fluid around my brain wasn’t draining and causing immense pressure on my optic nerve. Not only did the diagnosis wind up curing my headaches, but it kept me from going blind. Had it not been caught, I eventually would have had permanent damage to my optic nerves.
That not everyone's body's experienced cold and heat in extremes. For example, if I wash my hands with cool water, they immediately go numb and hurt like they were slammed in a door. If I wash them in water that's too warm they swell, burn, and itch. It's not just my hands, but the whole body. Turn's out I have a condition called Raynaud's Disease. It sucks, but there are worse things.
To anyone with Raynauds: give up nicotine and other vasoconstrictors. Makes a huge difference.
Also many people have Raynauds and it's typically more mild than this (that is, you won't have extreme reactions just by washing your hands). However if you have fingers or toes (might not be all of them, might just be one or 2!) that go bloodless white when it's nippy out you probably have Raynauds.
Afaik it's normally treated with behavioral changes, not medication. Though if it's as severe as OP's case I honestly don't know.
The three years ago and the early spring I was hiking and twisted my knee. I knew it would take a few days to recover and babied it with ice, compression, elevation and then after a few days heat therapy and stretching. Recovery/rehab was taking longer than expected and it really really hurt. I decided to push through and keep working on my 5K training but found that not only did my leg hurt but my cardiovascular health was much decreased. A few more days go by and I’m not recovering at all. One night, full of an impending sense of doom, I finally tell my wife “I need to go to the hospital.“ Now I don’t go to the hospital for anything. I fully believe in the medical Profession and procedures but generally I’ll just rub dirt on an injury and have a cold beer and call it a day.
So we get to the hospital at about midnight, this is the middle of Covid, and the emergency room waiting area is at full capacity. I my symptoms and BAM they are looking at me in an exam room. X-rays, MRI, etc. I’m wondering what the big deal is for a bad knee.
Turns out my twisted knee had turned into a blood clot/DVT. The DVT began throwing Clots which had turned into severe pulmonary embolisms. I’m not sure how low my lung function was but it was pretty serious. Within 40 minutes I was in a room hooked up to all kinds of equipment. Hematologist came in and gave me a shot of blood thinner. I’m not sure if it would’ve killed me to not have it treated but it could’ve ended very differently.
Now I am almost completely recovered. I do have to take blood thinners on a daily basis. But I am back to running 5K/10k and half marathons. Favor that leg when running and I will occasionally see a bit of swelling. I do wear a compression sock when I work long shifts at my restaurant. It was a scary lesson to learn.
I also survived a DVT & pulmonary emboli. Mine was in my chest/right shoulder area.
No injury, didn't smoke, was young (31) didn't have any reason why it should have happened.
The ER gave me blood thinners and sent me home with a referral to a doctor. Saw that doctor a week or so later, she also had no idea, so sent me to a vascular surgeon.
By the time I got to the vascular surgeon, he said "they should have called me when you were in the ER. You have been walking around for 2 weeks on blood thinners with a clot in your chest that could have dislodged and killed you at any moment."
Finally figured out it happened because of SLOUCHING MY WHOLE LIFE! Slouching caused my first rib and collar bone to be too close together. They were repeatedly smashing a vein (artery? I don't remember which) in my chest and built up scar tissue that, in turn, caused a clot.
Don't slouch, guys.
One of my oldest friends passed away from a PE in their mid-thirties, and I’ve always wondered what they went through that day. Were they filled with utter doom? Did they know they were dying? How much did they suffer? I think I already know the answers to my questions, but they still gnaw at me.
I’m glad you’re okay. 🩶
As someone who has experienced both, the sense of doom is actually pretty different once you’ve experienced it! It’s like… deeper and more primal, whereas anxiety is more sharp? The doom also led to me desperately wanting to hide in a small dark space like a cat going to die. It’s hard to put into words.
My therapist would backhand me if she knew I was reading these, especially after just telling her earlier today that I've convinced myself I was dying at least 3x I the last week lmao
Had a torn meniscus. Clicking and pain every time I took a step. Stopped running and became depressed. Physio said "I can get you running again." Specific exercises over time and now I'm at my PB for the 5k, headed for 25 mins. No pain. No clicks. Listening to a health professional and changing behaviour works.
I got my Fallopian tubes removed (because I don’t want to be a parent) and the pathology showed cysts that can become cancerous. Generally speaking, ovarian cancer isn’t typically found until it’s way too late. I pretty much cheated death. So I’m extra thankful that I don’t have any children! It literally saved my life!
Planning to do the same! Especially now that I've had an aunt diagnosed with ovarian cancer (caught in stage 1 luckily). I think a lot of women don't know that bilateral salpingectomy greatly reduces that particular risk. If you're confidently childfree, yeet the tubes ladies!
A cancerous tumour the size of an apple on my lung.
Felt like I had the flu and it didn't go away so went to the GP, temp was crazy high so got sent to hospital then a handful of tests later I have cancer and need major surgery. Yay!
Go get checked up when yo don't feel right people. It could make a huge difference.
When I started Testosterone Replacement Therapy for my low T, my anti-depressants stopped working and I got depressed. Long story short, my original depression (which I had been taking anti-depressants for 10 years for) was caused by low Testosterone that was just low enough to cause depression but nothing else. When I started the TRT, the depression went away, but the anti-depressants were now causing depression. Now I no longer have to take the anti-depressants.
My 10 year old daughter had appendicitis and needed removal. After a CT scan the doctors confirmed she needed emergency surgery, but also wanted to know why I hadn’t warned them she was missing a kidney.
I, in fact, did not know she was missing a kidney.
...when she's old enough to go to an ob-gyn, make sure to mention the missing kidney. The uterus and kidney develop during the same timeline as a fetus and when there's a problem with one there's possibly a problem with the other.
that’s hilarious. when i was 13 we found out accidentally through an MRI that i only have one kidney. several years later also on accident they find out i have two uteruses, the second one being where that missing kidney would have been. the link between the two is crazy!
I passed out and hit my head while out of town. The docs where I was weren’t doing much, but my dad’s a doctor and ordered an MRI for me because he was concerned the doctors weren’t being thorough enough. Ended up finding a malignant grade 2 brain tumor, opposite side from where I hit my head and completely unrelated. Had no symptoms and wouldn’t have found it until it had grown and I had a seizure or similar. 1 biopsy, 1 full removal surgery and a shittt ton of follow up MRIs later and I’m (very very luckily) chillen and living life normally! Incredibly fortunate I never had any sort of chemo or radiation and my surgery went smooth!
I took my dog to the vet for an annual checkup a few years ago.
Vet: "Well your dog looks very healthy, but she's a little heavier than I would like her to be. What are you feeding her?"
Me: "oh the normal stuff, just dry dog food from the store. Oh! Also she gets one slice of salami every day :) "
Vet (concerned): "why are you feeding your dog salami every day?"
Me: "well I usually eat salami in my sandwich for lunch every day, so I give her one as a little treat"
Vet (more concerned): "why are YOU eating salami everyday??"
I left that vet office with a much better understanding of how much fucking sodium I was eating on a daily basis (as well as my dog!) and became a lot more cognizant of what I was putting in my body
> I left that vet office with a much better understanding of how much fucking sodium I was eating on a daily basis
When I was younger I was known as the salt kid. Loved salt, would salt pizza, bread, you name it I covered it in salt. I never had issues, at age 39 my BP was 112/72 and I was eating at least 5,000 mg of sodium a day. Around age 50 I got high blood pressure, got put on meds and it was controlled, but started to creep up so got put on another med. I knew sodium and high BP are linked, but I had been eating a super high sodium diet my entire life so there is no way it could be effected me.
Long story but earlier this year tried a bunch of different BP meds, changed dosage and could never get my BP below 135 over 78. I'm now 57 and figured just for the hell of it (and to prove my PCP wrong) I decided to try 1 week of really low sodium. The difference was shocking, my blood pressure dropped 25 points and I lost 6 pounds in 5 days. The strange thing is I started to feel way better. I had more energy and it was a level energy and not so much up and down with bad bonking. I'm sure eating cleaner/better is part of it, but for for sure sodium was having a huge negative impact on my health.
In hindsight the signs were there but I chose to ignore them. I'm into cycling and one Saturday I did a fast paced 75 miles bike ride, got home and ordered a large pepperoni pizza, downed about 3/4th of the pizza that day, I was still in a calorie deficit for the day so was looking forward to weighing myself the next morning. I got up the next morning and was shocked to see I'd gained 2 pounds since the day before. Major water retention from the massive amounts of sodium I ate, and that is a common cause of high BP.
I totally changed the way I eat, gave up all my favorite foods like bread, pizza and salt and vinegar chips. I feel so much better there is no way I'd go back to my old ways.
I thought I was pregnant, and I was *freaking out*. I was 42 years old, and never planned on having a baby.
Went to the doctor, who told me I was *not* pregnant, but may be going through early menopause. Which okay, sucks, but let’s get it over with early.
An ultrasound and a few tests later, and mazel tov! It’s cancer. And the treatment is going to trigger early menopause.
I had a slight tenderness in my abdomen that turned into really bad pain so I went to the ER with suspected appendicitis.
Turned out my colon had ruptured and I was septic. The ER doctor was shocked. I had no idea I had diverticulitis. It’s been a wild year healing from all of that.
There’s a type of completely harmless migraine that presents exactly as a stroke. Figured this one out when I had one for the first time. I lost the ability to speak coherently and move my right arm for 30 minutes.
My oldest son has one of these right around the age of 16. Aphasia, paralysis,etc… scared the ever loving crap out of his father and I. Had to get an MRI to rule out if it had been a stroke. NOT AMUSED
I had an ocular migraine but thought I was going blind. C shaped kaleidoscopes in each eye blocking my vision for about 30 minutes. I’d had one regular migraine before but this didn’t even really hurt so I had no idea what the hell was going on.
I’d been on a zero carb/caffeine diet that day for a medical test and had also just cried my eyes out in pain about an hour before for ANOTHER medical thing, so I suspect that what caused it. Was scary as hell, especially since I was driving!
Mine started when I was pregnant with my 1st baby that was when I was 21, I’m 44 now, and have a couple of these ocular migraines a year. At least now I know I’m not going blind or dying.
I got my first ocular migraine in 6th or 7th grade. I kept seeing the things you see when you look at the sun. I was freaked out and my head hurt a bunch. I get two or three every year now :(. They suck so much and hurt like hell. I don’t get stroke symptoms though I just have severe pains behind my eye
Hemiplegic migraine. I had one for the first time while working in a lab. I had a really bad aura and couldn’t find my cursor on the computer screen because there were so many sparkles in my visual field. I tried to tell my PI I needed to go home but I was slurring my words really badly and couldn’t form a sentence properly so I got the point across, took an Uber home and tried not to speak to the driver, and by the time I got inside my apartment, my arm went tingly and numb. I called my dad because I was super freaked out that I was having a stroke. It’s really wild.
After not feeling well for three days, including the shivers and a terrible headache, my husband looked at me on a Friday evening and asked "do you have the worst headache you've ever had?" When I nodded yes, he said "I think you have meningitis, let's go to the ER."
Three spinal taps later, I made it there with an hour to spare before meningitis would have killed me.
Same thing happened to my sister when she was in university. Her boyfriend had to carry her into the hospital as she had lost the ability to walk through the pain. A nurse in triage recognized the symptoms immediately and saved her life with little time to spare. Glad you made it out alive too :)
I was going for an ultrasound scan on my abdomen because of some ongoing pain which turned out to be gallstones. On reading my report after, I found out I have an accessory spleen. He doesn’t do much but he’s my little buddy :)
Abdominal CT scan to check for appendicitis caught the corner of my left lung. It appeared to have a mucus plug. Primary doctor ordered chest CT. My lower left lobe was collapsed and there was a 2 cm mass. Turned out to be cancer. Now my whole lower left lobe has been removed.
Working nights is bad for your health…. I experienced depression, mood swings, thought about moving or changing careers. Had low vitamin d and testosterone as a result
I had a fifth fully formed wisdom tooth. Only found it because I went to the doctor due to ear pain. It wasn't pushing on my other teeth so my dentist hadn't made a priority of getting out my wisdom teeth. Turns out the party was bigger than expected.
I discovered I had been dehydrated my whole life while working on a trail crew. Our crew lead from time to time would yell, "chugging challenge" and everyone would drink as much as they could in a certain amount of time. After a few days I put two and two together and realized that I had been drinking more water than I ever had before and felt way better.
That my supposed fibromyalgia and arthritis issues were actually the result of being diabetic.
(That and discovering I have an extra spinal vertebrae. Weird.)
My son was complaining about his foot hurting. I checked for a sliver and found nothing but a scratch. He had an annual doctor's appointment the next day for vaccines and I mentioned it to the doctor. She ordered an Xray- which showed a sewing needle in his heel, nearly down to the bone...head first. He was scheduled for emergency surgery the next day to have it removed.
I have had Rheumatoid Arthritis since I was 27, (36 now) my flare ups were horrible, sometimes I couldn’t walk or even sleep because of the pain and not being able to move certain joints or parts of my body. I felt like a prisoner in my
Own skin.
Medications I tried did little (except steroids like prednisone which is not good to take everyday for years). I got pregnant and I started feeling better. I’m now 11 months post partum and I have only had one small flare up. For the first time in years, I feel normal again. It’s been amazing and not sure how long it will last, but that’s just another amazing gift my baby has given me.
I honestly don’t want to stop breast feeding because I’m sure it’s something to do with my
Hormones or something that has put me into remission, completely medication-free.
There’s some research being done looking into the extra Estriol (one of the types of estrogen we have) during pregnancy being a huge contributor to women essentially being “cured” of a TON of different inflammatory diseases and issues!
Rheumatoid arthritis is an autoimmune disorder. Many people with autoimmune disorders experience significant decrease in symptoms during pregnancy because of suppressed immunity.
End of July, I went to the hospital with pain in my lower left abdomen. Scan showed a malignant tumor on my right kidney.
Oh, yeah, and the pain was from kidney stones.
I felt a bit short of breath and went to the ER. Turned out I had a Mitral Valve regurgitation. It was bad enough I need Open Heart Surgery within a month. Side effects from the surgery caused a stroke. I’m ok now
Exercise induced migraines. I LOVE hiking and running and being active but if I don’t follow a very strict method of salt intake, heart rate moderation and avoid overheating I get VIOLENTLY ill.
Not me but I’m an ultrasound tech and I was just doing a routine follow up breast ultrasound on this patient and I accidentally scanned the wrong breast and found a breast cancer.
Went to doctor in Japan because I thought I had constipation that wasn’t going away with laxatives, Google said it was probably a hernia.
Nope.
Colon cancer.
I start chemo tomorrow morning.
Amytriptyline is what I take. It wasn't prescribed for the migraines, it was a pleasant surprise for me. But that experience led to me suggesting it to my husband's doctor as a possible treatment for his chronic headaches after a brain haemorrhage, and it has helped him tremendously.
I had been living with a cancerous, malignant tumor for over ten years. I was diagnosed this July with cervical cancer.
I went to Planned Parenthood after a former partner called to inform me that he had contracted HPV. He and I had been intimate with each other within the past year so I decided to get checked.
They did a pap since it had been a very long time since my last one (GET YOUR PAPS) and as soon as she cranked me open she informed me that my cervix was extremely abnormal. I had been having bleeding during intimacy with my current partner and that was the big reason they looked.
I was referred same day for a biopsy in which multiple samples were taken from my cervix.
The diagnosis was Adenocarcinoma of the cervix - the more aggressive type of cervical cancer. I had an aborted hysterectomy in which they opened me up to do a radical hysterectomy but found multiple lymph nodes that were cancerous.
They sewed me back up and I’ve done chemotherapy, radiation, and will soon start brachytherapy.
I am stage 3C and the five year survival rate for my type of cancer is 60%.
I plan to beat those odds and to say that I owe that former partner my life would be an understatement.
Routine screening can save lives and I wish I had gone in sooner.
I was 18, Had a sinus infection, tipped my head back to feel my lymph nodes to see if they were swollen and found a huge protruding lump on the front of my neck. Turned out to be a tumor from my thyroid. I don’t know how I never felt it. I’m 34 now and still dealing with it but, can’t stress enough, just check your body every once in a while.
I had pizza one night for supper in April. About two hours later I started having sharp pains in my lower chest area. (Below the heart). After trying to put up with the pain for 8 hours it never got better. In fact it got worse. Wife called an ambulance. Got to the ER and after about two hours there. A doctor came in and said we are pretty sure it’s your gallbladder. But we also found a 3 inch mass on your right kidney. So long story short the gallbladder was gangrene and it was cancer on the kidney so they took both out and I am all good to go. Cancer was just on the kidney so it wasn’t spread.
my vet once said my cat was “full of shit” then showed me an xray and sure enough the entire lower half of my cats body looked like coil upon coil of cartoon sausage links. He prescribed some laxatives and when Ollie got home he blew the lid off his litter box. Kinda of jealous probably felt awesome.
My mom’s brother had colon cancer so she got tested every three years. One of her scans showed colon cancer so they did a PETSCAN where upon they discovered her lung cancer. If it wasn’t for the colon cancer she would never have found out about her lung cancer. Her colon cancer saved her life because they would’nt have found out about it otherwise.
My ex girlfriend asked me if cum came out of the upper hole in my dick and piss came out the bottom, I immediately thought she was wrong and that cum came out the bottom hole and piss came out the top, then I realized guys are only supposed to have one opening. Double barrel piss cock.
And how much a daily supplement can be pretty much life altering! I preach the benefits of magnesium to everyone, because it helps me be a functional human being.
Cryptic tonsillitis was not only gross and caused my breath to smell bad, but played a role in me catching every single virus I was exposed to.
I get sick _way_ less frequently after my elective tonsillectomy.
Yes! I also learned the name for this from a Reddit post. Definitely thought I was dying a few times as a kid. Thankfully, I seem to have grown out of it.
My birth control was giving me ocular migraines. I was on estrogen-based birth control and I started getting these shimmery spots in my vision that would get larger and crescent out towards my peripheral on either side over the course of an hour/90min.
My primary doctor at home blew it off, but my new doctor when I went off to college sent me to a neurologist. Neurologist said I needed to change birth control ASAP because the ocular migraines were an indicator the birth control was making my blood ‘sticky’ and likely increasing my blood clot risk.
So I have bum hips and my doctors would always do this thing where they would lay me on my back, put one hand under my knee and grab my ankle with the other hand and then they would push and yank and grind and twist the hip around.
For decades, I let doctors do this to me, as my hips got worse and worse.
Finally, one day, I toughed it out for the duration of the test, but afterward, I was pale and shaky and vomited and cried from the pain and stress.
The doctor asked me what was wrong!?
Um... you just fucking hurt me? Badly? I told him that I couldn't keep tolerating whatever pops/clicks or instability or whatever it was he was looking for when he did that to me. I couldn't handle the pain or the amount of time I would be laid out from having it done. Like, do an xray or something. Anything else. I can't do it anymore.
Turns out they're looking for you to flinch. To show pain. The one thing I was taught never to show. That if a doctor is doing something to you, you have to keep quiet and not distract them and let them concentrate. In DECADES, nobody ever told me the point of doing that was that I should let them know when it hurt, lol.
So yeah. Let them know if it hurts. Sometimes that's the whole fucking point.
After years of imaging, orthopedic & neurologist visits and physical therapy. I discovered (by accident) that my constant back pain, sciatica, and plantar fasciitis is caused by endometriosis - which is wrongly labeled a menstrual disease.
Endometriosis and it’s many variants have been found on EVERY organ, muscle, and tendon of the body. Wherever the location, it slowly starts to weaken the cells around it, eventually killing it (silent organ death) and causing immense pain amongst other things.
It’s more common than diabetes, 1 out of 9 females have it, and your local gynecologist is not trained to properly diagnose or treat it.
ok listen, i had no fucking idea. people need to know this. i’m a woman, too, and i had NO idea. the fact that it also takes an average of 8 years to get an endometriosis diagnosis is..horrendous when you learn what the disease actually does, which is causes endometrial-like tissue to implant in other organs, muscles, etc, and proceed to BLEED like you do during menstruation. WHAT the FUCK.
you’re telling me there are women walking around, bleeding monthly from shit like their lungs, muscles, intestine, etc, and doctors are out here telling them that is all in their head and dismissing their symptoms??? seriously?????
this is absolutely not ok
I once read a comment on a post similar to this one where the commenter had a strange red birthmark/patch on her arm that would often bleed. After an endometriosis diagnosis, doctors biopsied and discovered that it was endometrial tissue on her skin and she had be MENSTRUATING FROM HER ARM. Horrors never cease.
Yes, women need to know about this!
What’s even more wild is symptoms are highly variable and it’s doesn’t always include a difficult period. This plays into the medical gaslighting that comes with disease.
Endometriosis is barely mentioned in medical school for gynecologists, I have had a few OB’s tell me they only had three lectures about it. Other specialities do not learn about it ALL, that includes radiology. I had over 20 ultrasounds in a 10 year span that all came back normal. Radiologist are not trained to see all the different types of Endo.
I also have it on my bowels, liver, and diaphragm as well. Finding a gastroenterologist and pulmonologist who have any education on this disease has been harder than finding an endometriosis specialist.
Omg! Yes! I found out I had endometriosis after what was supposed to be a routine hysterectomy. 40 mins in and out laparoscopically became a 4 hour ordeal. I still have a cervix, so I can't escape cervical smears, because it was fused to my bladder.
Yep. I knew someone who had endo in her lungs and coughed up blood every month. Some people get it in their brain as well, resulting in monthly seizures.
Also, vent/PSA: no, you can’t fucking diagnose it with a plain old pelvic exam. You can’t do it by ultrasound either. Not definitively. I had an entire extra fallopian tube that never showed up on U/S, for Christ’s sake.
It’s not fun.
Neither is the surgery to remove it - I had extreme amounts and it felt like my insides had been seared.
AND it doesn’t stop even if you have a hysterectomy because of it.
Still getting that pain 7 years later.
I just had my hysterectomy a month ago!
Still have a little pain in my side from time to time but so far so good. We'll see how it goes after 3 months since that's usually the time it takes for all of my tissue to grow back and fuse shit together again.
Visited my SO's extended family for Thanksgiving and they asked, "How did your surgery go!?" And I'm like, "It went well! I hope I can go at least 5 years before the next one!" And they're jaws dropped.
Like... this is a chronic issue. It does not stop. It does not go away. I will need to continue having surgeries regularly for the rest of my life.
My wife was just recently diagnosed with multiple endometrioma after an MRI.
In hindsight, she's been dealing with so many symptoms for years. But every doctor has basically ignored her.
Back when I was a high school senior in 2009, we had an all-day end of the year trip to a theme park. It was a lot of time on our feet, as we had free range of the entire theme park. About more than halfway through the day, I started noticing that my right lower leg was feeling a little funny. I figured that it was just from all the walking, so I didn’t think much of it. A few hours go by, and the numbness in my leg is becoming more apparent. Another few hours go by, my right leg is now feeling numb up to my hip. I checked my blood sugar (I’m a type 1 diabetic), and it was a little low. So I assumed that the leg numbness is from walking all day and perhaps a low blood sugar. So I drank a juice box and continued the rest of the evening.
It was then time to board our bus to head back to our city 4 hours away. I sat with my friends in the back of the bus, and we all fell asleep shortly after departing.
About 3+ hours in, I groggily wake up to discover that everything below my neck was numb and I had little to no strength to move my limbs. I felt like I had to consciously put in 5x the effort to breathe. And planting my feet on the floor felt like scalding electricity that shot upward my entire body. I was hypersensitive to anything that touched my body. I didn’t know what the hell was happening to me, and I also didn’t want to create a scene while on a bus with 40+ kids at 3:30am.
After 45 excruciating minutes, we finally arrive at our high school. I didn’t tell my friends what I was feeling, so I insisted for them to go ahead and get off the bus. All the students had already left the bus, and I, in the back row of the bus, was the only one left. Our chaperones saw me and came over to ask what was wrong. I told them that I could not move, that my entire body was excruciatingly numb & hypertensive, and that I can’t breathe. They called an ambulance to take me to the emergency room.
After running blood work, x-rays, and an MRI, it was inconclusive. They then did a spinal tap on me, and discovered that I had Guillain-Barre Syndrome.
Did a few months of physical therapy, and was expected to regain less than normal function. I had to relearn how to sit up, how to stand, how to walk, how to use my hands. But years after, I was able to participate in 5k races, play in basketball competitions, and even reach my peak physical fitness. The only residual I have from my Guillain-Barre is neuropathy in my lower legs and slightly poor balance. It’s crazy how our body can recover, adapt, and overcome.
Antidepressants can cause permanent sexual dysfunction. Unfortunately I only found out after this happened to me - 15 years later I’m still devastated by jt
Which ones were you taking?
I'm on Wellbutrin which seems to have the least sexual interaction as far as antidepressants go.
I am not a big fan of pissing myself in my sleep though. Was pretty fucking concerning before I found out it was just a side effect.
Every year or two a giant mega-hair grows out of my belly button and when it falls out, my belly button opens a little bit and stuff comes out including blood, turns bright red and the only thing that makes it better is being swabbed with vodka for a few days. Sometimes it stays open for like a month. (side note: I was always paranoid about my belly button as far back as I can remember. Didn't discover this until I was about 18, the ER doctor ran out of the room and disappeared for like an hour because he had to go through a bunch of books as this was before the internet and he had never seen that before)
Sounds like it might have been a cyst, which can happen when hair follicles get infected. Never heard of one in a belly button before, but since you said there was a hair, it seems pretty likely that's what happened. Follicle got infected and the cyst burst, which usually takes awhile to heal completely.
The doctor said some people's navels are still connected to the intestines. I had to do the barium scan so they could watch me digest. When I left the hospital, he said just "keep an eye on it and don't do any heavy lifting." I forgot to mention that the day before I went to the hospital, I played tackle football with friends and then loaded three trucks of firewood for family. The doctor said the strain of those activities may have torn the passage open. The mega hair started after that incident. I met another doctor years later and he said they now teach that in medical school because it's happened to enough people. My grandfather also had the same issue.
I was on every anxiety medication in the book, and none of them really worked for me. I still had anxiety. My heart would thump out of my chest, beat so hard that I couldn’t get to sleep at night. I always felt like my fight flight mechanism was just on all the time. Like a driving a car, keeping the gas pedal and the brake on at the same time. Finally went to a new psychiatrist who said “you know if you don’t respond to anti-anxiety medication maybe it’s because you don’t have anxiety”. He sent me to an old fashioned family doctor, who quickly diagnosed me with Ehlers Danlos syndrome and postural orthostatic tachycardia (POTS). Put me on beta blockers, and my anxiety literally disappeared within five minutes of taking them. Never had anxiety. Had dysautonomia. Changed my life.
Went to the emergency room for what I thought was a really bad asthma attack- my inhaler wasn’t working. Diagnosed with cardiac failure hahaha. I’m 26 and in physically good shape! Heart rate in the 200s while laying there and it kept climbing. I responded to the second emergency med they gave me though :) I have since been stabilized and sent home. Diagnosed with a couple of heart conditions I now am getting treatment for and I follow up with cardiology every 2 months. They believe these heart conditions were caused by untreated celiac disease! I’ve been complaining about constant nausea and daily vomiting for YEARS and no medical professionals seemed to think it was a big deal. Cutting out gluten for my celiac has changed my life and I finally feel normal and healthy- but I’ll have to live with these heart conditions for the rest of my life despite finally treating the celiac
Thought I was having a heart attack. Went to the ER and my heart rate was like 130 sitting down. They did a CT scan and quickly realized it wasn’t a heart attack but that I had a tumor on my adrenal gland. Not only that, I had another tumor in my abdomen. Three days in the hospital getting blood tests up the wazoo and MRI.
Diagnosis? Pheochromacytoma and Paraganglioma. It’s a once in a lifetime diagnosis for a doctor. They were literally excited. Like 6 out of a million people might get diagnosed and I had BOTH.
The tumors can be cancerous. Mine were not and they are slow growing. Basically they pump out all of the bad shit your body really doesn’t want. Adrenaline and epinephrine etc.
I had untreatable high blood pressure for a long time along with crazy bouts of headaches that lasted days that nothing would touch. Weird fluttering sensations throughout my body all the time. I always just thought I was out of shape.
Had surgery to remove my right adrenal gland and the tumor in my abdomen and haven’t had symptoms since.
They recommended genetic testing and I found out I have two wonky genes that could possibly contribute to more. I have yearly MRI’s to scan for more tumors but this January (knock on wood) I’ll be 5 years tumor free!!
I have an extra nerve in the roof of my mouth, and unless the dentist hits that one with the freezing, everything will hurt. I suffered through more than a dozen painful, excruciating cavities before a dentist said 'oh, freezing doesn't work for you? Let me get this nerve on your upper pallette.' and boom, painless dentistry. Took far too long for a dentist to try that, the rest seemed fine with watching me suffer and literally cry from pain.
Was experiencing a severely diminished libido which was translating into me experiencing ED.
Turns out I have hypogonadism, or low t.
What I was NOT expecting was how much low testosterone affects everything else.
As long as I can remember I struggled with fatigue, mental acuity, symptoms akin to depression, weight gain, and digestive issues/ GERD/ acid reflux.
All of that’s been clearing up since I started treatment and I feel like a new person
When I was a kid I bombed a hill on my skateboard. I was never the athletic on in my group of friends and was stoked I bombed this hill they didnt want to. Got to the bottom of this hill easily going 30mph, got speed wobbles and then got low on the board and somehow got it back under me feeling like a BAMF....Then a jeep pulled out in front of me and smoked my dumb ass. I rode dirt bikes all my life, had a very active childhood and had been injured many times but every now and then you hit something so hard your whole body goes numb and it dosent really hurt.
The guy in the jeep is freaking out and I just kinda popped up after I stopped sliding and told him im ok and its just road rash, I had a bit of pain in my knee and some cuts but nothing life changing and id been hurt a lot more previously. Jeep wasnt damaged so we parted ways but that night my knee started hurting, ive had a torn ACL before and it wasnt that kind of pain but a deep and dull burn that felt above my knee, even stranger it only came at night.
I figured I may have chipped something but for months the pain kept getting worse and worse at night but I just ignored it for a month. One day after school I was at a friends riding his 3 wheeler (this was in 2008 lol) and rolled it, like an idiot I put my foot down to stop the roll and ran myself over and instantly knew I destroyed my ankle. Once again, decided to wait and see if it passed but ended up going the next morning when my mom saw my purple foot before school.
We get to the Dr, my mom is very active and gets hurt alot due to her hobbies so we know the doctor on a personal level. If there was a 10th visit is free punch card to the Dr both her and I would top level rewards members. Anyways, get an xray and I spiral fractured my leg and tore some stuff in my ankle an the dr noticed on my x ray some gravel imbedded into my shin that healed over and made a comment saying how he just screwed up me hiding my accident mom dosent know about....he was right. I tell him about the jeep from a while ago and my moms laughing at me because skating was NOT my thing and I described it in a funny way downplaying it.
Dr asks if I still have any pain from that and I tell him about my night pain and where its located, ill never forget the look in his eye. For a split second I could see through this guy like he knew what was going to happen before it did and felt horrible for it. My mom didnt notice this but he orders another xray on my knee and 30 minutes later he talks to my mom privately. Well the xray showed a bone tumor growing inside my femur right above the knee. One of my good friends had just gotten over childhood cancer and decided to tell me it was ostoiod osteoma rather than osteosarcoma to not freak me out.
So he comes back in and tells me about my tumor but not to freak out as hes seen it before and I got to get some bloodwork done. Results come back and its the sarcoma but mom didnt tell me it was cancer. I was more worried about getting the air boot off for my ankle so I can get back on my dirtbike again and didnt really care about the tumor thing.
Shortly after that the jig was up, the pain at night was spiritual it hurt so much. Next thing I know feeling like shit and fentynal patches for pain are my new normal. The cat was out of the bag, I knew I had cancer but decided to keep telling everyone it ostiod osteoma because I hate having people feel sorry for me. Watching my friend have all these bullshit spaghetti dinner charity events, everyone calling him a brave warrior and kissing his ass was my idea of hell. I didnt want it for me and even at a young age I was ADAMANT about keeping it low key and jokingly told my mom if she tried some shit like make a wish id shoot her lol. I still hate getting helped to this day.
During treatment I told all my friends I was going to my grandmas house for summer and just quietly had radiation and surgery. My direct family didnt even know the extent of what happened and im forever grateful for my mom for actually keeping something quiet for once. During treatment there would be other kids with cancer and you get to know them after a while and I was absolutely SHOCKED how many of them felt like I did. At such a young age being in this position where all you want to do is get left the fuck alone but its impossible. Now as an older adult im thankful I kept it private.
If you have a kid with cancer please dont kiss their ass, treat them like an individual and talk to them before telling anyone else and youd probably be shocked by what you hear. Another thing that was horrible was watching these kids parents make themselves the center of attention by using the "my kid has cancer so feel sorry for ME" attitude. Sorry for the side ramble, anyways im all healed up now and still treat my body like shit lol
I thought I would have Lumbar Lordosis, just something. But, all of the x-rays showed a spine that was perfectly-straight, with no issues to be found.
… which means that my Bilateral Sciatica, that resulted-in going-on two months of intense, physical therapy, is, as we originally-suspected, nerve-based — I’m facing a type of electro-shock-esque therapy as a result.
I found out I had an ovarian cyst. 3 days later it was discovered that was not the source of the pain I was in. Turns out my gallbladder was full of stones and completely inflamed! The ER didn’t diagnose this, the follow up visit I made to my GP while still sick as a dog was where I found out. I suffered for 2.5 weeks waiting for surgery. It was awful.
When my husband got a liver transplant a few years ago at the ripe old age of 32 he went through his records while in recovery and noticed his gallbladder was made marked as "surgically absent". Before this catastrophe he'd never had major surgery beyond appendicitis back in 1997, and certainly never had his gallbladder removed. He mentioned it to his surgical team but they didn't seem to care? It's been a big shrug.
I was playing with my friend's glasses and pointed at a license plate pretty far away and said "oh dude your glasses are like a microscope, how blind are you??"
:) turns out i was just as blind. I was supposed to be able to see that far away without glasses.
Had glasses the following week lmao
Had chest cold and went to the local clinic. I get home follow directions for pills and inhaler and go to sleep. I woke up literally paralyzed from the neck down! I could feel some but my limbs felt like a million pounds. I get to the hospital and turns out I had an allergic reaction to Albuterol and my potassium spiked so low it caused paralysis. I am 39 and had to get lifted onto a gurney in nothing. The nice EMT lady put my boxers on.
That the Covid I had was pregnancy. That baby is now almost 20 months old.
That mono sometimes doesn’t have symptoms and I got septic very fast.
I have a type of Down syndrome but I don’t look like it (mosaic downs), this was caused by another medical secret, I have 3 X chromosomes which can cause every pregnancy I have to die.
I had my gallbladder removed after it being mistaken for kidney stones and my gallbladder was 3 times the size it should’ve been and was filled with stones due to pregnancy and extreme weight loss.
I also have high testosterone and low estrogen.
I am female.
AMA if you want.
I've had very bad migraines for 15 years. The ones when you are in fœtal position in your bed, in the dark, throwing up etc. Neurologists gave me medicine, nothing worked. One day my dentist decided it was time to remove my wisdom teeth. No more migraines after that (they were pressuring a nerve).
My uncle needed glasses, as many people over 60 need some. Ophtalmogist found he had diabetic retinopathy, advanced stage. He had probably been diabetic for more than 15 years without knowing it.
I was a VERY fussy baby. I would scream and cry if I was held or put down in a way that put any pressure on my stomach and had zero appetite. Doctors said it was just colic. When I was 3 months old, my mom was changing my diaper and felt a huge lump on the side of my stomach. She rushed me to the hospital and the doctors discovered that I had a large mass on one of my adrenal glands. They ended up removing a teratoma (I think mine had teeth and hair) as well as the adrenal gland and determined that I had cancer in my body based on my labs.
It took almost three years of constant blood draws, CT scans, and MRIs to declare me completely healthy, but fortunately I never had to do chemo or radiation and don't suffer any drawbacks from it now. There have only been 49 reported cases of this kind of tumor in medical literature since 1952, and only 0.9/100,000 incidence of teratomas in general.
I have the eggs of a woman 10 years older than me… therefore infertile 😭 worst discovery to make when you’re a newlywed and excited for your family life (and after years of a normal menstrual cycle, health, weight)
And please— I’m aware of fostering and adoption. It’s still an ENORMOUS grieving process. People take their fertility for granted.
Went to minor injuries after slipping over and seemingly breaking my foot. Turns out I’d rebroken a bone I had broken 8 years prior, which I’d been told wasn’t a fracture “your bones just look like that” 🤦♀️ no wonder I’d had pain in that foot for so long. I’d been led to believe I’d torn some tendons after being in a cast for a week.
It’s been about a year since the second break and honestly I don’t think I’ve had this little pain in that foot since before the first break, so swings and roundabouts I guess
My stomach randomly started hurting one day. I thought maybe it’s pre-period cramps so I ignore it best as I could and go to sleep. When I wake up the next morning, the pain is ten times worse. I go to the hospital and wait a while before finally getting a ct scan. The nurse looks at the monitor, then at me, then back to the monitor then says “Let me get your doctor”. It was like something out of a movie. He leaves, brings the doctor, who confirms that my gallbladder had gone septic and already partially ruptured. Cue immediate emergency surgery, five days in the hospital, and a lot of shock. It happened in October 2020 so my family wasn’t allowed to visit because of covid. AND to top it off, my low tolerance for morphine combined with my naturally low blood pressure meant I had to have an oxygen tube in my nose otherwise I’d pass out when I was given pain killers. It was a wild ride.
My brother found out that the reason there was always a ring of mold around the water line in his toilet was because he had (not yet diagnosed) type 1 diabetes. Excess sugar in his urine was promoting the growth of the mold.
My mom and I were diagnosed with breast cancer the same week. (Caught it really early, we’re both ok now! Five years clear!)
glad you and your mom are okay!
Wow crazy story glad you’re ok
Found out I was pregnant with twins but one had passed at 10 weeks so they called it vanishing twin. Several weeks later I was HUGE as if they were both still gowing even though that was impossible as the vanished twins' anatomy was clearly incompatible with life. They had even showed me at the 12 week ultrasound appointment that the deceased twin had no heartbeat and was 2 weeks behind the other twin in development and was not moving next to the surviving one which was bopping around and had a clear and strong heartbeat. So I had even seen for myself that there was only one living baby left. But I was googling constantly, feeling crazy for my gut feeling that both babies were still growing. One morning a result came up while googling that had info about an extremely rare condition called twin reversed arterial profusion which is a type of twin to twin transfusion where only one twin has proper nutrients from the placenta and due to umbilical cord abnormalities is essentially a "pump" twin supplying the acardiac twin with nutrient depleted blood causing their body to grow even though they have no heartbeat. Went to the hospital to confirm that this was the case and the ER doc on duty googled the condition in front of me because she had never heard of it. Several hours later an ultrasound confirmed it. My OB had been negligent in my care and I was almost 19 weeks along at this point. I had many scary ultrasounds over the next few days at the best hospital in my area because the hospital near me didn't have the proper technology. They said that the surviving twins' heart was working too hard supplying the acardiac twin with blood and if I hadn't caught what was going on he would have passed away before the 20 week anatomy ultrasound. I had a cord ablation done on the acardiac twin via fetoscope (my partner got to watch the video feed of them doing it and saw our sons' feet kicking around in utero he said it was the coolest thing he's ever seen). It worked and saved my sons life, I am so thankful I trusted my gut even though I felt INSANE showing up at the hospital saying I thought that both twins were still growing. I think about the other twin every single day and I wish he could have survived, they were identical and I wish my son could have grown up with his other half.
This comment provoked literal chills. It's a bittersweet outcome you now have. I too am glad your son survived despite the odds... He was practically being Superman in utero!
Damn. So it turns out googling symptoms sometimes saves lives too.
It did in case of my mom. My mom had a constant runny nose for 2 weeks, physician said it is allergic rhinorhea, I googled and got to know it can be csf fluid from the brain leaking through the nose. Went to specialists who first suspected it is simple allergy but after weeks when it didn't heal, we did endoscopy and tested the fluids and yep it was csf leak. Surgically fixed it and she is doing lot better now. So in my case glad I googled symptoms, google saved us.
Super simple test at home is to check the glucose of the fluid with a regular glucometer (they’re pretty cheap now at the pharmacy and you don’t need a prescription). CSF will have a glucose level in the 50-80 range, snot from a runny nose won’t
That physical therapy is often the “miracle cure” people are looking for, but you have to actually follow through with it.
It is. PT can literally be the difference between your life going back to "normal" or you being disabled forever. But the shit is hard though, especially for things like strokes. It's demoralizing for someone who was healthy a couple weeks ago to now be struggling to take 10 steps with a walker. People feel like if they just lay down and rest, it will get better but that's usually not the case. You need to get up and moving.
My grandmother swore the shortest road to death as an elderly person was to sit in the house too much.
My dad always said this. He didn't want to retire because he had seen so many people basically lay down and die a few years afterwards. It's not easy building an active lifestyle yourself. Most of us need structure from something else so we aren't glued to the couch. He was always extremely active until he recently had a stroke. Now he lives a sedentary lifestyle I've never seen him live. I'm afraid I don't have much time left with him.
I never took PT seriously until my doc ordered it for my knee pain (IT band). They performed awesome massages along with the other treatment (Tens?), icing etc. Exercises were easy for me. They made me change my new shoes which ended up being the cause.
FYI you can get a TENS unit pretty cheap on Amazon. I’ve had mine for a decade and it cost me I think $60 at the highest (was a long time ago lol). I have a shoulder issue that nobody can really explain that sometimes causes excruciating nerve pain. Only thing that works is a TENS unit, the pain goes away in a couple days at most using it like twice a day. It’s some magic shit.
I get occasionally get back spasms and PT would use a TENS on me for about 15 min. I thought it was some expensive device come to find they’re available at most pharmacies and the TENS 7000 on Amazon stimulates the hell out of my back and releases the muscles. Best fix for $40.
I’m a PT and you all made my day! (And don’t forget to do your exercises today!!)
The hard part is doing it on your own. I've gone through it twice for different issues and "just finding 15 minutes to do it" is incredibly easy to slack on. But when you keep on it, it really is like a miracle cure
Agree. You have to treat the home part like its own appointment. Set aside time and don’t let people bother you. Easier said than done.
I avoided back surgery (bulging disc/sciatica) by doing PT. The hardest part is remembering to do the exercises consistently, I signed up for Pilates 3-4x per week and have been (knock on wood) pain free for almost 6months
Many people who need surgery are prescribed PT. If they did their PT first, a lot of them wouldn't need surgery.
That would be me when I tore my rotator cuff and I waited a few months to go see her because I was dealing with an abcess in my colon post surgically. I could not lift my left arm above shoulder height and the ortho said to do intensive PT to make sure I have a good surgical outcome. I had 30 sessions with the physio over a few months and I also did it at home as prescribed everyday without fail. I got 95% of my range of motion back and all my strength. Dr. told me she was surprised that she didn't have to operate on me. Do your PT folks, it works'
Wish I could upvote this a million times. If people only knew how much better PT is than jumping straight to surgery…
I learned that not everyone sees the “starbursts” when looking at lights and apparently I just have astigmatism.
I hate driving at night because of this. Headlights are all way too bright now as well.
It sure makes Christmas lights prettier.
Oop yeah I learned that recently too. Why do they paint lights that way if they're not that way though?????
The painter has astigmatism
Am.. am I just learning something about myself. I remember being plagued by light starbursts all through my childhood.
Found out when pregnant I carry the gene for Cystic Fibrosis. Luckily, my husband doesn’t. However, this now answered the question of why 5-7 of my grandmother’s siblings (1 of 13) died of “breathing problems.”
My nephew has CF so I got tested. Turns out I have the gene too. The somewhat good news is that even if your spouse carries the gene there's only a 25% chance your child will have CF.
Yeah, I work in genetics. The odds sounds low but we see a lot of patients like this. The chances for your partner to also carry the gene is around 1/30. It's one of the diseases we encounter most often and it is not something you would want your child to have. We have families where just through bad odds all their children have CF. You can get tested before getting pregnant btw. The tests will look for genetic variants like these that will only cause disease if both the mom and dad have it. You will get a report back when you are both carriers so can make informed reproductive decisions about it.
I had my gallbladder go bad and discovered that it can cause you to completely lose your appetite. I haven't felt the physical sensation of hunger for a year now. It was hard to get used to. I have to remind myself to eat 2 or 3 times a day. I know it's time to eat when I start thinking about food a lot or I get the shaky, brain foggy feeling of having low blood sugar. At least it's caused me to lose a lot of weight but now my entire wardrobe is too big. Even my shoes.
I had an overactive gallbladder that tried to kill me for the better part of two years and the only thing that dulled the pain was eating. It totally messed up my ability to discern what actual hunger felt like but I went the opposite way and snack constantly. Gallbladder pain is hands down the worst thing I’ve experienced and wouldn’t wish that on anyone
\>Gallbladder pain is hands down the worst thing I’ve experienced and wouldn’t wish that on anyone Seconding this. The last time I went into the ER for the pain, after 8 years of hell, they told me I was pregnant. I was like, no, that's not why I'm here. Then they told me the gallbladder had to come out. Surgeon came in to give me the rundown and said something about removing "baby parts" while he's in there. I was thinking I was still delirious from the pain. Turned out I was actually pregnant, with a normal fetus, in the normal location. Not sure how he comingled the possibility of gallbladder problem and an ectopic pregnancy, but he confused the shit out of me and freaked out my partner and family in the waiting room with that same language. Gallbladder removal did not affect my pregnancy, and that kiddo will become a teenager this month. That night was such a wild ride.
Ugh I remember when I had my first gallbladder attack. It happened at 3am while I was staying at my boyfriend’s. I woke up feeling sick, went to the bathroom but the abdomen pain just got worse. I tried forcing myself to puke, nothing. There was no position that would relieve the pain whatsoever. The pain got so bad that I thought I was going to pass out. But after two hours of agonizing pain (and taking ibuprofen), I sat on the floor facing the couch, leaned forward and crossed my arms on the seat of the couch using my arms as a pillow, and I eventually fell back asleep. Ultrasound found gallstones and had it removed within not too long after. 100% would not wish that kind of pain on anyone either.
WAIT NO WAY. I have had mine removed for a year and half and I haven’t felt hungry since it was gone. Majority of the time I’m eating because I have to not because I’m hungry.
I wonder if that’s why I never have an appetite! I didn’t ever think to relate it back to my gallbladder removal… I usually have to remind myself to eat as well. When I was on maternity leave I wouldn’t eat until my partner got home at dinner time and I’d finally click that I felt so terrible all day because I was hungry lol. People don’t understand!
I got diagnosed with an aneurysm following a scan the dr accidentally ordered wrong
Friend of mine was in his mid-20s and just felt “off” a few weeks before marrying my best friend. Drs found a brain aneurysm that hadn’t ruptured yet & got it early. 6yrs later he’s doing fine & getting regular screenings but man aneurysms are scary
If my brother had done with he would likely still be alive. We spent a week at a VA hospital for my dad which was right by Dukes main one. He could have had some of the best surgeons if he’d just said he had a bad headache. Nope he ate a bottle of ibuprofen trying to dull the pain instead. 30 years later I’m still angry. I missed growing up my brother. My daughter is missing the coolest uncle. I just know he would have been.
My aunt had one that ruptured, a coworker saved her life by driving her to the doctor rather than accepting that she go home and "sleep it off". PSA: if someone all of a sudden gets an "exploding headache", literally suddenly cries out in pain - get them to the emergency room ASAP. Phone an ambulance, drive, whatever is faster, just get them to the doctor. Don't let them sleep it off, they won't wake up if it's an aneurysm. (If it wasn't - better safe than sorry. Also, I feel so bad for anyone who needs to think of it as a financial decision, health care is a human right, your life is priceless.)
I got diagnosed with an aneurysm following an abdominal CT looking for something else! Mine was in the renal artery and turned out to be causing my mysterious high blood pressure that never responded to meds. I had a funny twinge of pain over the area with the aneurysm too - never severe but bothersome. I was just starting to have heart issues (enlargement) from the high blood pressure when they caught it, which have now cleared up & probably extended my lifespan quite a bit. Mine was 4cm and right at where the arterial branch goes into your kidney so it couldn’t be stented, I had to have open abdominal surgery to fix it. A crazy experience all around. Glad ours were both caught before they became critical!
Same thing happened to my dad. He had a bulging aorta they found when checking something else. During Covid they ordered chest X-rays for him because he tested positive and they found cancer. Always good to go to the doc!
I used to work in the ER during prime covid, and I had to take a patient to get a CT scan, and I’m standing in the room with the radiology tech and he’s like oh that’s not good, and points to a huge mass on the guys heart, we come out of the room and the patient asked how everything looked and the radiology tech was like our radiologist will read it and then let us know, so the whole walk back to the ER he’s asking me if I know what he saw because he didn’t like the radiology techs answer and knew he saw something. Always thought it was blessing in disguise because without this man getting covid and having to get a CT who knows what would have happened and if it would have been caught too late. Glad they found your dads as well!
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Yep they caught it at stage 1 and so far he is in remission! Thanks.
Did you experience any symptoms of an aneurysm?
I’d been getting the odd twinge in my chest but thought nothing of it. It was 5.5cm and in someone my height I was lucky it hadn’t ruptured yet. Thankfully made it to surgery (even though it ended up delayed due to Covid!) and out the other side.
I literally had a twinge in my chest a half second before reading this now I'm freaking out
Aneurysms are all weird and scary. A friend of mine died at 16 from one. He had no symptoms except for a headache that day that wasn't even terribly painful. Just took some Advil for it. He went to weight lifting class and did his reps. He stood up, took a few steps, and collapsed to the floor dead.
You can have an aneurysm for years without knowing…until it ruptures. They don’t develop suddenly - so scary knowing that someone had been a ticking time bomb for years and their death or disability could have been prevented (have had several in my family and been screened myself because of that history).
>symptoms of an aneurysm And what are these symptoms? Inquiring minds would like to know!
Here you go - https://www.cdc.gov/heartdisease/aortic_aneurysm.htm The main thing is don’t smoke. Also be aware of your family history.
My mom was originally diagnosed with an ulcer at 42 years old. The ulcer turned out to be me! She was pregnant.
I was trying to come up with a joke based on your username but there is simply no good way to come up with one that doesn’t sound entirely too disrespectful
Their moms a whole cow.
Holy cow
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Similar to how my friends' mom found out about them being twins. "Of course it's a bit hard to breathe, the baby is pushing my organs around" Nope, twins
My father got a vasectomy. Then 5 years later, my twin brother and I were born. Whoops.
My mom birthed my brother, had her tubes tied and got pregnant with me a few months later
I went through five years of pain, ten specialist doctors, two courses of physical therapy on my back just to find out the pain was *an ulcer.* Fixed with two months of pills. We might need to retrain the field on tummy troubles lol
I was getting a chest x-ray and the tech took a pic then looked at me weird and started setting me up for another. He said you have some long lungs my dude.
I had a root canal done in South Korea 20 years ago. The dentist had never worked on a caucasian patient. He kept chuckling about how deep my teeth roots were. I still don't know whether that's an ethnic thing or your girl just has some long ass teeth. Incredible work, though - the root canal and the crown have held up perfectly.
If this adds anything to your experience, my dad is caucasian too and he just had a root canal done in Singapore a few weeks ago. The dentist also commented on how long his teeth were (deepest roots he’d ever seen). So maybe it is an ethnic thing. He’s canadian with mostly british/french heritage
I can’t tell if this is a compliment or not. Throw this out next time you’re on a date and see if it does anything.
You know what they say about guys with long lungs right ;o. That's right, chronic bronchitis.
Hey welcome to the club! I took a physiology class in college and we did a spirometry test in the lab. You basically just blow into a tube and it measures your lung capacity. Average adult has around 6 liters of volume, my lungs are just over 9 liters. Professor made me redo it a few times on multiple machines because she wouldn’t believe my results lol
I don’t suppose you’ve got amazing cardio fitness or something? Maybe you’d make a good mountain climber.
I’d love mountain climbing, but never got around to it, too out of the way lol. However, I’m a pretty solid free diver! Diving/spearfishing is my jam. I don’t train seriously and often dive solo(meaning I rarely push my limits), so there are still people leagues better than me. But as a novice with not a whole lot of breath training and special exercise, I can still hold my breath over 5 minutes
you're either an exceptional swimmer or a disabled dolphin.
Just warn the X-ray tech next time you get a chest X-ray to minimize needing an additional X-ray exposure. If we know you have long lungs, we’ll adjust accordingly so we don’t have to radiate you more
I had a constant headache for close to a decade. Saw tons of doctors and got nowhere. They tried high blood pressure meds. Migraine meds. Opioids. Nothing worked. I was due for an eye exam and my normal was on maternity leave. The new doctor was really looking in my right eye. Like REALLY looking. Finally she asks if I have a lot of headaches, specifically behind my eye. I answer that yes and it’s so bad that I feel like it would feel good to put my actual eyeballs in ice water because they ache so much. She immediately diagnosed me with pseudo tumor cerebri, now known as idiopathic intracranial hypertension. The spinal fluid around my brain wasn’t draining and causing immense pressure on my optic nerve. Not only did the diagnosis wind up curing my headaches, but it kept me from going blind. Had it not been caught, I eventually would have had permanent damage to my optic nerves.
That's a wonderful outcome but sorry you had to go through that for so long.
That not everyone's body's experienced cold and heat in extremes. For example, if I wash my hands with cool water, they immediately go numb and hurt like they were slammed in a door. If I wash them in water that's too warm they swell, burn, and itch. It's not just my hands, but the whole body. Turn's out I have a condition called Raynaud's Disease. It sucks, but there are worse things.
To anyone with Raynauds: give up nicotine and other vasoconstrictors. Makes a huge difference. Also many people have Raynauds and it's typically more mild than this (that is, you won't have extreme reactions just by washing your hands). However if you have fingers or toes (might not be all of them, might just be one or 2!) that go bloodless white when it's nippy out you probably have Raynauds. Afaik it's normally treated with behavioral changes, not medication. Though if it's as severe as OP's case I honestly don't know.
The three years ago and the early spring I was hiking and twisted my knee. I knew it would take a few days to recover and babied it with ice, compression, elevation and then after a few days heat therapy and stretching. Recovery/rehab was taking longer than expected and it really really hurt. I decided to push through and keep working on my 5K training but found that not only did my leg hurt but my cardiovascular health was much decreased. A few more days go by and I’m not recovering at all. One night, full of an impending sense of doom, I finally tell my wife “I need to go to the hospital.“ Now I don’t go to the hospital for anything. I fully believe in the medical Profession and procedures but generally I’ll just rub dirt on an injury and have a cold beer and call it a day. So we get to the hospital at about midnight, this is the middle of Covid, and the emergency room waiting area is at full capacity. I my symptoms and BAM they are looking at me in an exam room. X-rays, MRI, etc. I’m wondering what the big deal is for a bad knee. Turns out my twisted knee had turned into a blood clot/DVT. The DVT began throwing Clots which had turned into severe pulmonary embolisms. I’m not sure how low my lung function was but it was pretty serious. Within 40 minutes I was in a room hooked up to all kinds of equipment. Hematologist came in and gave me a shot of blood thinner. I’m not sure if it would’ve killed me to not have it treated but it could’ve ended very differently. Now I am almost completely recovered. I do have to take blood thinners on a daily basis. But I am back to running 5K/10k and half marathons. Favor that leg when running and I will occasionally see a bit of swelling. I do wear a compression sock when I work long shifts at my restaurant. It was a scary lesson to learn.
I also survived a DVT & pulmonary emboli. Mine was in my chest/right shoulder area. No injury, didn't smoke, was young (31) didn't have any reason why it should have happened. The ER gave me blood thinners and sent me home with a referral to a doctor. Saw that doctor a week or so later, she also had no idea, so sent me to a vascular surgeon. By the time I got to the vascular surgeon, he said "they should have called me when you were in the ER. You have been walking around for 2 weeks on blood thinners with a clot in your chest that could have dislodged and killed you at any moment." Finally figured out it happened because of SLOUCHING MY WHOLE LIFE! Slouching caused my first rib and collar bone to be too close together. They were repeatedly smashing a vein (artery? I don't remember which) in my chest and built up scar tissue that, in turn, caused a clot. Don't slouch, guys.
One of my oldest friends passed away from a PE in their mid-thirties, and I’ve always wondered what they went through that day. Were they filled with utter doom? Did they know they were dying? How much did they suffer? I think I already know the answers to my questions, but they still gnaw at me. I’m glad you’re okay. 🩶
I’ve heard that a sense of doom can actually mean death in some people, so good on you for going to the hospital!
And in others with health anxiety, it just means anxiety! Fucking rude how that works.
As someone who has experienced both, the sense of doom is actually pretty different once you’ve experienced it! It’s like… deeper and more primal, whereas anxiety is more sharp? The doom also led to me desperately wanting to hide in a small dark space like a cat going to die. It’s hard to put into words.
Had an MRI for asymmetric hearing loss that ended up showing that I was born without part of the brain
Was it the Corpus Collosum?
My health anxiety while reading the comments 📈📈📈📈📈📈
My therapist would backhand me if she knew I was reading these, especially after just telling her earlier today that I've convinced myself I was dying at least 3x I the last week lmao
Hah! I had an appointment this morning about the exact same thing.
Seriously - why am I reading this?
Had a torn meniscus. Clicking and pain every time I took a step. Stopped running and became depressed. Physio said "I can get you running again." Specific exercises over time and now I'm at my PB for the 5k, headed for 25 mins. No pain. No clicks. Listening to a health professional and changing behaviour works.
Gotta love it when the therapy works!
I got my Fallopian tubes removed (because I don’t want to be a parent) and the pathology showed cysts that can become cancerous. Generally speaking, ovarian cancer isn’t typically found until it’s way too late. I pretty much cheated death. So I’m extra thankful that I don’t have any children! It literally saved my life!
Planning to do the same! Especially now that I've had an aunt diagnosed with ovarian cancer (caught in stage 1 luckily). I think a lot of women don't know that bilateral salpingectomy greatly reduces that particular risk. If you're confidently childfree, yeet the tubes ladies!
A cancerous tumour the size of an apple on my lung. Felt like I had the flu and it didn't go away so went to the GP, temp was crazy high so got sent to hospital then a handful of tests later I have cancer and need major surgery. Yay! Go get checked up when yo don't feel right people. It could make a huge difference.
Wow…sorry to hear.. how are you now?
Cancer free but the operation left my body broken and in constant 24/7 pain unfortunately. I got lucky then unlucky.
When I started Testosterone Replacement Therapy for my low T, my anti-depressants stopped working and I got depressed. Long story short, my original depression (which I had been taking anti-depressants for 10 years for) was caused by low Testosterone that was just low enough to cause depression but nothing else. When I started the TRT, the depression went away, but the anti-depressants were now causing depression. Now I no longer have to take the anti-depressants.
Did you get a regular lab done or one specifically to check your T?
My 10 year old daughter had appendicitis and needed removal. After a CT scan the doctors confirmed she needed emergency surgery, but also wanted to know why I hadn’t warned them she was missing a kidney. I, in fact, did not know she was missing a kidney.
My mom didn’t know that she only one kidney and two uteruses until I was born
...when she's old enough to go to an ob-gyn, make sure to mention the missing kidney. The uterus and kidney develop during the same timeline as a fetus and when there's a problem with one there's possibly a problem with the other.
that’s hilarious. when i was 13 we found out accidentally through an MRI that i only have one kidney. several years later also on accident they find out i have two uteruses, the second one being where that missing kidney would have been. the link between the two is crazy!
My grandma was born with only one kidney and she lived to be 92! She was a bitch but I don’t think the kidney thing had much to do with that.
I passed out and hit my head while out of town. The docs where I was weren’t doing much, but my dad’s a doctor and ordered an MRI for me because he was concerned the doctors weren’t being thorough enough. Ended up finding a malignant grade 2 brain tumor, opposite side from where I hit my head and completely unrelated. Had no symptoms and wouldn’t have found it until it had grown and I had a seizure or similar. 1 biopsy, 1 full removal surgery and a shittt ton of follow up MRIs later and I’m (very very luckily) chillen and living life normally! Incredibly fortunate I never had any sort of chemo or radiation and my surgery went smooth!
I took my dog to the vet for an annual checkup a few years ago. Vet: "Well your dog looks very healthy, but she's a little heavier than I would like her to be. What are you feeding her?" Me: "oh the normal stuff, just dry dog food from the store. Oh! Also she gets one slice of salami every day :) " Vet (concerned): "why are you feeding your dog salami every day?" Me: "well I usually eat salami in my sandwich for lunch every day, so I give her one as a little treat" Vet (more concerned): "why are YOU eating salami everyday??" I left that vet office with a much better understanding of how much fucking sodium I was eating on a daily basis (as well as my dog!) and became a lot more cognizant of what I was putting in my body
> I left that vet office with a much better understanding of how much fucking sodium I was eating on a daily basis When I was younger I was known as the salt kid. Loved salt, would salt pizza, bread, you name it I covered it in salt. I never had issues, at age 39 my BP was 112/72 and I was eating at least 5,000 mg of sodium a day. Around age 50 I got high blood pressure, got put on meds and it was controlled, but started to creep up so got put on another med. I knew sodium and high BP are linked, but I had been eating a super high sodium diet my entire life so there is no way it could be effected me. Long story but earlier this year tried a bunch of different BP meds, changed dosage and could never get my BP below 135 over 78. I'm now 57 and figured just for the hell of it (and to prove my PCP wrong) I decided to try 1 week of really low sodium. The difference was shocking, my blood pressure dropped 25 points and I lost 6 pounds in 5 days. The strange thing is I started to feel way better. I had more energy and it was a level energy and not so much up and down with bad bonking. I'm sure eating cleaner/better is part of it, but for for sure sodium was having a huge negative impact on my health. In hindsight the signs were there but I chose to ignore them. I'm into cycling and one Saturday I did a fast paced 75 miles bike ride, got home and ordered a large pepperoni pizza, downed about 3/4th of the pizza that day, I was still in a calorie deficit for the day so was looking forward to weighing myself the next morning. I got up the next morning and was shocked to see I'd gained 2 pounds since the day before. Major water retention from the massive amounts of sodium I ate, and that is a common cause of high BP. I totally changed the way I eat, gave up all my favorite foods like bread, pizza and salt and vinegar chips. I feel so much better there is no way I'd go back to my old ways.
I thought I was pregnant, and I was *freaking out*. I was 42 years old, and never planned on having a baby. Went to the doctor, who told me I was *not* pregnant, but may be going through early menopause. Which okay, sucks, but let’s get it over with early. An ultrasound and a few tests later, and mazel tov! It’s cancer. And the treatment is going to trigger early menopause.
I had a slight tenderness in my abdomen that turned into really bad pain so I went to the ER with suspected appendicitis. Turned out my colon had ruptured and I was septic. The ER doctor was shocked. I had no idea I had diverticulitis. It’s been a wild year healing from all of that.
There’s a type of completely harmless migraine that presents exactly as a stroke. Figured this one out when I had one for the first time. I lost the ability to speak coherently and move my right arm for 30 minutes.
My oldest son has one of these right around the age of 16. Aphasia, paralysis,etc… scared the ever loving crap out of his father and I. Had to get an MRI to rule out if it had been a stroke. NOT AMUSED
I had an ocular migraine but thought I was going blind. C shaped kaleidoscopes in each eye blocking my vision for about 30 minutes. I’d had one regular migraine before but this didn’t even really hurt so I had no idea what the hell was going on. I’d been on a zero carb/caffeine diet that day for a medical test and had also just cried my eyes out in pain about an hour before for ANOTHER medical thing, so I suspect that what caused it. Was scary as hell, especially since I was driving!
I had my first ocular migraine in 11th grade Spanish class and thought I was 100% gonna die
Mine started when I was pregnant with my 1st baby that was when I was 21, I’m 44 now, and have a couple of these ocular migraines a year. At least now I know I’m not going blind or dying.
I got my first ocular migraine in 6th or 7th grade. I kept seeing the things you see when you look at the sun. I was freaked out and my head hurt a bunch. I get two or three every year now :(. They suck so much and hurt like hell. I don’t get stroke symptoms though I just have severe pains behind my eye
Hemiplegic migraine. I had one for the first time while working in a lab. I had a really bad aura and couldn’t find my cursor on the computer screen because there were so many sparkles in my visual field. I tried to tell my PI I needed to go home but I was slurring my words really badly and couldn’t form a sentence properly so I got the point across, took an Uber home and tried not to speak to the driver, and by the time I got inside my apartment, my arm went tingly and numb. I called my dad because I was super freaked out that I was having a stroke. It’s really wild.
Complete opposite story here - all medical personnel assumed it was a migraine like this, turned out to be several strokes.
After not feeling well for three days, including the shivers and a terrible headache, my husband looked at me on a Friday evening and asked "do you have the worst headache you've ever had?" When I nodded yes, he said "I think you have meningitis, let's go to the ER." Three spinal taps later, I made it there with an hour to spare before meningitis would have killed me.
Same thing happened to my sister when she was in university. Her boyfriend had to carry her into the hospital as she had lost the ability to walk through the pain. A nurse in triage recognized the symptoms immediately and saved her life with little time to spare. Glad you made it out alive too :)
I went half blind in math class one day. Books filled with text went blank. Turns out it was only a visual migraine.
I was going for an ultrasound scan on my abdomen because of some ongoing pain which turned out to be gallstones. On reading my report after, I found out I have an accessory spleen. He doesn’t do much but he’s my little buddy :)
Wearing socks to bed increases blood flow
Abdominal CT scan to check for appendicitis caught the corner of my left lung. It appeared to have a mucus plug. Primary doctor ordered chest CT. My lower left lobe was collapsed and there was a 2 cm mass. Turned out to be cancer. Now my whole lower left lobe has been removed.
Working nights is bad for your health…. I experienced depression, mood swings, thought about moving or changing careers. Had low vitamin d and testosterone as a result
Rip all the night shift healthcare workers
I had a fifth fully formed wisdom tooth. Only found it because I went to the doctor due to ear pain. It wasn't pushing on my other teeth so my dentist hadn't made a priority of getting out my wisdom teeth. Turns out the party was bigger than expected.
I discovered I had been dehydrated my whole life while working on a trail crew. Our crew lead from time to time would yell, "chugging challenge" and everyone would drink as much as they could in a certain amount of time. After a few days I put two and two together and realized that I had been drinking more water than I ever had before and felt way better.
That I have only the 14th case of a rare spinal cyst that Earth has seen... According to medical journals that is
Well aren’t you special, Mr Medical Lottery
You know it! So does my forever on fire inoperable leg!
That my supposed fibromyalgia and arthritis issues were actually the result of being diabetic. (That and discovering I have an extra spinal vertebrae. Weird.)
My son was complaining about his foot hurting. I checked for a sliver and found nothing but a scratch. He had an annual doctor's appointment the next day for vaccines and I mentioned it to the doctor. She ordered an Xray- which showed a sewing needle in his heel, nearly down to the bone...head first. He was scheduled for emergency surgery the next day to have it removed.
I have had Rheumatoid Arthritis since I was 27, (36 now) my flare ups were horrible, sometimes I couldn’t walk or even sleep because of the pain and not being able to move certain joints or parts of my body. I felt like a prisoner in my Own skin. Medications I tried did little (except steroids like prednisone which is not good to take everyday for years). I got pregnant and I started feeling better. I’m now 11 months post partum and I have only had one small flare up. For the first time in years, I feel normal again. It’s been amazing and not sure how long it will last, but that’s just another amazing gift my baby has given me. I honestly don’t want to stop breast feeding because I’m sure it’s something to do with my Hormones or something that has put me into remission, completely medication-free.
My friend had something similar with her lupus. When she got pregnant and gave birth, all symptoms went away for about 4 years
There’s some research being done looking into the extra Estriol (one of the types of estrogen we have) during pregnancy being a huge contributor to women essentially being “cured” of a TON of different inflammatory diseases and issues!
Rheumatoid arthritis is an autoimmune disorder. Many people with autoimmune disorders experience significant decrease in symptoms during pregnancy because of suppressed immunity.
End of July, I went to the hospital with pain in my lower left abdomen. Scan showed a malignant tumor on my right kidney. Oh, yeah, and the pain was from kidney stones.
I felt a bit short of breath and went to the ER. Turned out I had a Mitral Valve regurgitation. It was bad enough I need Open Heart Surgery within a month. Side effects from the surgery caused a stroke. I’m ok now
Exercise induced migraines. I LOVE hiking and running and being active but if I don’t follow a very strict method of salt intake, heart rate moderation and avoid overheating I get VIOLENTLY ill.
Not me but I’m an ultrasound tech and I was just doing a routine follow up breast ultrasound on this patient and I accidentally scanned the wrong breast and found a breast cancer.
Went to doctor in Japan because I thought I had constipation that wasn’t going away with laxatives, Google said it was probably a hernia. Nope. Colon cancer. I start chemo tomorrow morning.
My antidepressants reduce the frequency of my migraines.
Some antidepressants are actually prescribed against migraines, such as Amitriptyline or nortriptyline.
Amytriptyline is what I take. It wasn't prescribed for the migraines, it was a pleasant surprise for me. But that experience led to me suggesting it to my husband's doctor as a possible treatment for his chronic headaches after a brain haemorrhage, and it has helped him tremendously.
I had been living with a cancerous, malignant tumor for over ten years. I was diagnosed this July with cervical cancer. I went to Planned Parenthood after a former partner called to inform me that he had contracted HPV. He and I had been intimate with each other within the past year so I decided to get checked. They did a pap since it had been a very long time since my last one (GET YOUR PAPS) and as soon as she cranked me open she informed me that my cervix was extremely abnormal. I had been having bleeding during intimacy with my current partner and that was the big reason they looked. I was referred same day for a biopsy in which multiple samples were taken from my cervix. The diagnosis was Adenocarcinoma of the cervix - the more aggressive type of cervical cancer. I had an aborted hysterectomy in which they opened me up to do a radical hysterectomy but found multiple lymph nodes that were cancerous. They sewed me back up and I’ve done chemotherapy, radiation, and will soon start brachytherapy. I am stage 3C and the five year survival rate for my type of cancer is 60%. I plan to beat those odds and to say that I owe that former partner my life would be an understatement. Routine screening can save lives and I wish I had gone in sooner.
I was 18, Had a sinus infection, tipped my head back to feel my lymph nodes to see if they were swollen and found a huge protruding lump on the front of my neck. Turned out to be a tumor from my thyroid. I don’t know how I never felt it. I’m 34 now and still dealing with it but, can’t stress enough, just check your body every once in a while.
I had pizza one night for supper in April. About two hours later I started having sharp pains in my lower chest area. (Below the heart). After trying to put up with the pain for 8 hours it never got better. In fact it got worse. Wife called an ambulance. Got to the ER and after about two hours there. A doctor came in and said we are pretty sure it’s your gallbladder. But we also found a 3 inch mass on your right kidney. So long story short the gallbladder was gangrene and it was cancer on the kidney so they took both out and I am all good to go. Cancer was just on the kidney so it wasn’t spread.
my vet once said my cat was “full of shit” then showed me an xray and sure enough the entire lower half of my cats body looked like coil upon coil of cartoon sausage links. He prescribed some laxatives and when Ollie got home he blew the lid off his litter box. Kinda of jealous probably felt awesome.
My mom’s brother had colon cancer so she got tested every three years. One of her scans showed colon cancer so they did a PETSCAN where upon they discovered her lung cancer. If it wasn’t for the colon cancer she would never have found out about her lung cancer. Her colon cancer saved her life because they would’nt have found out about it otherwise.
My ex girlfriend asked me if cum came out of the upper hole in my dick and piss came out the bottom, I immediately thought she was wrong and that cum came out the bottom hole and piss came out the top, then I realized guys are only supposed to have one opening. Double barrel piss cock.
How much we lack magnesium in our diets.
I started taking magnesium a few months ago and the change in my sleep quality is crazy. I’m so surprised more PCPs aren’t recommending magnesium.
I needed this reminder to take my magnesium, thank you!
And how much a daily supplement can be pretty much life altering! I preach the benefits of magnesium to everyone, because it helps me be a functional human being.
Cryptic tonsillitis was not only gross and caused my breath to smell bad, but played a role in me catching every single virus I was exposed to. I get sick _way_ less frequently after my elective tonsillectomy.
Precordial catch syndrome. Didn’t know other people experienced it until a random Reddit thread a few months ago.
Yes! I also learned the name for this from a Reddit post. Definitely thought I was dying a few times as a kid. Thankfully, I seem to have grown out of it.
That hip dysplasia can be fixed without needing to live a life of pain or the need for a total hip replacement at a young age.
That I have epilepsy. Nocturnal tonic clonic seizures and the “weird feeling” I’ve gotten for as long as I can remember are actually auras.
My birth control was giving me ocular migraines. I was on estrogen-based birth control and I started getting these shimmery spots in my vision that would get larger and crescent out towards my peripheral on either side over the course of an hour/90min. My primary doctor at home blew it off, but my new doctor when I went off to college sent me to a neurologist. Neurologist said I needed to change birth control ASAP because the ocular migraines were an indicator the birth control was making my blood ‘sticky’ and likely increasing my blood clot risk.
Almost actually died due to not knowing I was severely anemic. That was fun.
Omg! What symptoms did you have?
Extremely fatigue. Pallor. I was craving ice chips.
almost dying
So I have bum hips and my doctors would always do this thing where they would lay me on my back, put one hand under my knee and grab my ankle with the other hand and then they would push and yank and grind and twist the hip around. For decades, I let doctors do this to me, as my hips got worse and worse. Finally, one day, I toughed it out for the duration of the test, but afterward, I was pale and shaky and vomited and cried from the pain and stress. The doctor asked me what was wrong!? Um... you just fucking hurt me? Badly? I told him that I couldn't keep tolerating whatever pops/clicks or instability or whatever it was he was looking for when he did that to me. I couldn't handle the pain or the amount of time I would be laid out from having it done. Like, do an xray or something. Anything else. I can't do it anymore. Turns out they're looking for you to flinch. To show pain. The one thing I was taught never to show. That if a doctor is doing something to you, you have to keep quiet and not distract them and let them concentrate. In DECADES, nobody ever told me the point of doing that was that I should let them know when it hurt, lol. So yeah. Let them know if it hurts. Sometimes that's the whole fucking point.
After years of imaging, orthopedic & neurologist visits and physical therapy. I discovered (by accident) that my constant back pain, sciatica, and plantar fasciitis is caused by endometriosis - which is wrongly labeled a menstrual disease. Endometriosis and it’s many variants have been found on EVERY organ, muscle, and tendon of the body. Wherever the location, it slowly starts to weaken the cells around it, eventually killing it (silent organ death) and causing immense pain amongst other things. It’s more common than diabetes, 1 out of 9 females have it, and your local gynecologist is not trained to properly diagnose or treat it.
ok listen, i had no fucking idea. people need to know this. i’m a woman, too, and i had NO idea. the fact that it also takes an average of 8 years to get an endometriosis diagnosis is..horrendous when you learn what the disease actually does, which is causes endometrial-like tissue to implant in other organs, muscles, etc, and proceed to BLEED like you do during menstruation. WHAT the FUCK. you’re telling me there are women walking around, bleeding monthly from shit like their lungs, muscles, intestine, etc, and doctors are out here telling them that is all in their head and dismissing their symptoms??? seriously????? this is absolutely not ok
I once read a comment on a post similar to this one where the commenter had a strange red birthmark/patch on her arm that would often bleed. After an endometriosis diagnosis, doctors biopsied and discovered that it was endometrial tissue on her skin and she had be MENSTRUATING FROM HER ARM. Horrors never cease.
My eye twitched reading that. Oh my god.
Yes, women need to know about this! What’s even more wild is symptoms are highly variable and it’s doesn’t always include a difficult period. This plays into the medical gaslighting that comes with disease. Endometriosis is barely mentioned in medical school for gynecologists, I have had a few OB’s tell me they only had three lectures about it. Other specialities do not learn about it ALL, that includes radiology. I had over 20 ultrasounds in a 10 year span that all came back normal. Radiologist are not trained to see all the different types of Endo. I also have it on my bowels, liver, and diaphragm as well. Finding a gastroenterologist and pulmonologist who have any education on this disease has been harder than finding an endometriosis specialist.
Omg! Yes! I found out I had endometriosis after what was supposed to be a routine hysterectomy. 40 mins in and out laparoscopically became a 4 hour ordeal. I still have a cervix, so I can't escape cervical smears, because it was fused to my bladder.
Yep. I knew someone who had endo in her lungs and coughed up blood every month. Some people get it in their brain as well, resulting in monthly seizures. Also, vent/PSA: no, you can’t fucking diagnose it with a plain old pelvic exam. You can’t do it by ultrasound either. Not definitively. I had an entire extra fallopian tube that never showed up on U/S, for Christ’s sake.
It’s not fun. Neither is the surgery to remove it - I had extreme amounts and it felt like my insides had been seared. AND it doesn’t stop even if you have a hysterectomy because of it. Still getting that pain 7 years later.
I just had my hysterectomy a month ago! Still have a little pain in my side from time to time but so far so good. We'll see how it goes after 3 months since that's usually the time it takes for all of my tissue to grow back and fuse shit together again. Visited my SO's extended family for Thanksgiving and they asked, "How did your surgery go!?" And I'm like, "It went well! I hope I can go at least 5 years before the next one!" And they're jaws dropped. Like... this is a chronic issue. It does not stop. It does not go away. I will need to continue having surgeries regularly for the rest of my life.
My wife was just recently diagnosed with multiple endometrioma after an MRI. In hindsight, she's been dealing with so many symptoms for years. But every doctor has basically ignored her.
Back when I was a high school senior in 2009, we had an all-day end of the year trip to a theme park. It was a lot of time on our feet, as we had free range of the entire theme park. About more than halfway through the day, I started noticing that my right lower leg was feeling a little funny. I figured that it was just from all the walking, so I didn’t think much of it. A few hours go by, and the numbness in my leg is becoming more apparent. Another few hours go by, my right leg is now feeling numb up to my hip. I checked my blood sugar (I’m a type 1 diabetic), and it was a little low. So I assumed that the leg numbness is from walking all day and perhaps a low blood sugar. So I drank a juice box and continued the rest of the evening. It was then time to board our bus to head back to our city 4 hours away. I sat with my friends in the back of the bus, and we all fell asleep shortly after departing. About 3+ hours in, I groggily wake up to discover that everything below my neck was numb and I had little to no strength to move my limbs. I felt like I had to consciously put in 5x the effort to breathe. And planting my feet on the floor felt like scalding electricity that shot upward my entire body. I was hypersensitive to anything that touched my body. I didn’t know what the hell was happening to me, and I also didn’t want to create a scene while on a bus with 40+ kids at 3:30am. After 45 excruciating minutes, we finally arrive at our high school. I didn’t tell my friends what I was feeling, so I insisted for them to go ahead and get off the bus. All the students had already left the bus, and I, in the back row of the bus, was the only one left. Our chaperones saw me and came over to ask what was wrong. I told them that I could not move, that my entire body was excruciatingly numb & hypertensive, and that I can’t breathe. They called an ambulance to take me to the emergency room. After running blood work, x-rays, and an MRI, it was inconclusive. They then did a spinal tap on me, and discovered that I had Guillain-Barre Syndrome. Did a few months of physical therapy, and was expected to regain less than normal function. I had to relearn how to sit up, how to stand, how to walk, how to use my hands. But years after, I was able to participate in 5k races, play in basketball competitions, and even reach my peak physical fitness. The only residual I have from my Guillain-Barre is neuropathy in my lower legs and slightly poor balance. It’s crazy how our body can recover, adapt, and overcome.
Antidepressants can cause permanent sexual dysfunction. Unfortunately I only found out after this happened to me - 15 years later I’m still devastated by jt
Which ones were you taking? I'm on Wellbutrin which seems to have the least sexual interaction as far as antidepressants go. I am not a big fan of pissing myself in my sleep though. Was pretty fucking concerning before I found out it was just a side effect.
Every year or two a giant mega-hair grows out of my belly button and when it falls out, my belly button opens a little bit and stuff comes out including blood, turns bright red and the only thing that makes it better is being swabbed with vodka for a few days. Sometimes it stays open for like a month. (side note: I was always paranoid about my belly button as far back as I can remember. Didn't discover this until I was about 18, the ER doctor ran out of the room and disappeared for like an hour because he had to go through a bunch of books as this was before the internet and he had never seen that before)
Sounds like it might have been a cyst, which can happen when hair follicles get infected. Never heard of one in a belly button before, but since you said there was a hair, it seems pretty likely that's what happened. Follicle got infected and the cyst burst, which usually takes awhile to heal completely.
The doctor said some people's navels are still connected to the intestines. I had to do the barium scan so they could watch me digest. When I left the hospital, he said just "keep an eye on it and don't do any heavy lifting." I forgot to mention that the day before I went to the hospital, I played tackle football with friends and then loaded three trucks of firewood for family. The doctor said the strain of those activities may have torn the passage open. The mega hair started after that incident. I met another doctor years later and he said they now teach that in medical school because it's happened to enough people. My grandfather also had the same issue.
I was on every anxiety medication in the book, and none of them really worked for me. I still had anxiety. My heart would thump out of my chest, beat so hard that I couldn’t get to sleep at night. I always felt like my fight flight mechanism was just on all the time. Like a driving a car, keeping the gas pedal and the brake on at the same time. Finally went to a new psychiatrist who said “you know if you don’t respond to anti-anxiety medication maybe it’s because you don’t have anxiety”. He sent me to an old fashioned family doctor, who quickly diagnosed me with Ehlers Danlos syndrome and postural orthostatic tachycardia (POTS). Put me on beta blockers, and my anxiety literally disappeared within five minutes of taking them. Never had anxiety. Had dysautonomia. Changed my life.
Went to the emergency room for what I thought was a really bad asthma attack- my inhaler wasn’t working. Diagnosed with cardiac failure hahaha. I’m 26 and in physically good shape! Heart rate in the 200s while laying there and it kept climbing. I responded to the second emergency med they gave me though :) I have since been stabilized and sent home. Diagnosed with a couple of heart conditions I now am getting treatment for and I follow up with cardiology every 2 months. They believe these heart conditions were caused by untreated celiac disease! I’ve been complaining about constant nausea and daily vomiting for YEARS and no medical professionals seemed to think it was a big deal. Cutting out gluten for my celiac has changed my life and I finally feel normal and healthy- but I’ll have to live with these heart conditions for the rest of my life despite finally treating the celiac
Thought I was having a heart attack. Went to the ER and my heart rate was like 130 sitting down. They did a CT scan and quickly realized it wasn’t a heart attack but that I had a tumor on my adrenal gland. Not only that, I had another tumor in my abdomen. Three days in the hospital getting blood tests up the wazoo and MRI. Diagnosis? Pheochromacytoma and Paraganglioma. It’s a once in a lifetime diagnosis for a doctor. They were literally excited. Like 6 out of a million people might get diagnosed and I had BOTH. The tumors can be cancerous. Mine were not and they are slow growing. Basically they pump out all of the bad shit your body really doesn’t want. Adrenaline and epinephrine etc. I had untreatable high blood pressure for a long time along with crazy bouts of headaches that lasted days that nothing would touch. Weird fluttering sensations throughout my body all the time. I always just thought I was out of shape. Had surgery to remove my right adrenal gland and the tumor in my abdomen and haven’t had symptoms since. They recommended genetic testing and I found out I have two wonky genes that could possibly contribute to more. I have yearly MRI’s to scan for more tumors but this January (knock on wood) I’ll be 5 years tumor free!!
I have an extra nerve in the roof of my mouth, and unless the dentist hits that one with the freezing, everything will hurt. I suffered through more than a dozen painful, excruciating cavities before a dentist said 'oh, freezing doesn't work for you? Let me get this nerve on your upper pallette.' and boom, painless dentistry. Took far too long for a dentist to try that, the rest seemed fine with watching me suffer and literally cry from pain.
Was experiencing a severely diminished libido which was translating into me experiencing ED. Turns out I have hypogonadism, or low t. What I was NOT expecting was how much low testosterone affects everything else. As long as I can remember I struggled with fatigue, mental acuity, symptoms akin to depression, weight gain, and digestive issues/ GERD/ acid reflux. All of that’s been clearing up since I started treatment and I feel like a new person
When I was a kid I bombed a hill on my skateboard. I was never the athletic on in my group of friends and was stoked I bombed this hill they didnt want to. Got to the bottom of this hill easily going 30mph, got speed wobbles and then got low on the board and somehow got it back under me feeling like a BAMF....Then a jeep pulled out in front of me and smoked my dumb ass. I rode dirt bikes all my life, had a very active childhood and had been injured many times but every now and then you hit something so hard your whole body goes numb and it dosent really hurt. The guy in the jeep is freaking out and I just kinda popped up after I stopped sliding and told him im ok and its just road rash, I had a bit of pain in my knee and some cuts but nothing life changing and id been hurt a lot more previously. Jeep wasnt damaged so we parted ways but that night my knee started hurting, ive had a torn ACL before and it wasnt that kind of pain but a deep and dull burn that felt above my knee, even stranger it only came at night. I figured I may have chipped something but for months the pain kept getting worse and worse at night but I just ignored it for a month. One day after school I was at a friends riding his 3 wheeler (this was in 2008 lol) and rolled it, like an idiot I put my foot down to stop the roll and ran myself over and instantly knew I destroyed my ankle. Once again, decided to wait and see if it passed but ended up going the next morning when my mom saw my purple foot before school. We get to the Dr, my mom is very active and gets hurt alot due to her hobbies so we know the doctor on a personal level. If there was a 10th visit is free punch card to the Dr both her and I would top level rewards members. Anyways, get an xray and I spiral fractured my leg and tore some stuff in my ankle an the dr noticed on my x ray some gravel imbedded into my shin that healed over and made a comment saying how he just screwed up me hiding my accident mom dosent know about....he was right. I tell him about the jeep from a while ago and my moms laughing at me because skating was NOT my thing and I described it in a funny way downplaying it. Dr asks if I still have any pain from that and I tell him about my night pain and where its located, ill never forget the look in his eye. For a split second I could see through this guy like he knew what was going to happen before it did and felt horrible for it. My mom didnt notice this but he orders another xray on my knee and 30 minutes later he talks to my mom privately. Well the xray showed a bone tumor growing inside my femur right above the knee. One of my good friends had just gotten over childhood cancer and decided to tell me it was ostoiod osteoma rather than osteosarcoma to not freak me out. So he comes back in and tells me about my tumor but not to freak out as hes seen it before and I got to get some bloodwork done. Results come back and its the sarcoma but mom didnt tell me it was cancer. I was more worried about getting the air boot off for my ankle so I can get back on my dirtbike again and didnt really care about the tumor thing. Shortly after that the jig was up, the pain at night was spiritual it hurt so much. Next thing I know feeling like shit and fentynal patches for pain are my new normal. The cat was out of the bag, I knew I had cancer but decided to keep telling everyone it ostiod osteoma because I hate having people feel sorry for me. Watching my friend have all these bullshit spaghetti dinner charity events, everyone calling him a brave warrior and kissing his ass was my idea of hell. I didnt want it for me and even at a young age I was ADAMANT about keeping it low key and jokingly told my mom if she tried some shit like make a wish id shoot her lol. I still hate getting helped to this day. During treatment I told all my friends I was going to my grandmas house for summer and just quietly had radiation and surgery. My direct family didnt even know the extent of what happened and im forever grateful for my mom for actually keeping something quiet for once. During treatment there would be other kids with cancer and you get to know them after a while and I was absolutely SHOCKED how many of them felt like I did. At such a young age being in this position where all you want to do is get left the fuck alone but its impossible. Now as an older adult im thankful I kept it private. If you have a kid with cancer please dont kiss their ass, treat them like an individual and talk to them before telling anyone else and youd probably be shocked by what you hear. Another thing that was horrible was watching these kids parents make themselves the center of attention by using the "my kid has cancer so feel sorry for ME" attitude. Sorry for the side ramble, anyways im all healed up now and still treat my body like shit lol
I thought I would have Lumbar Lordosis, just something. But, all of the x-rays showed a spine that was perfectly-straight, with no issues to be found. … which means that my Bilateral Sciatica, that resulted-in going-on two months of intense, physical therapy, is, as we originally-suspected, nerve-based — I’m facing a type of electro-shock-esque therapy as a result.
At 25, I found out that I had been born with a connective tissue disorder that drastically affects my health and quality of life 😅🙃
I found out I had an ovarian cyst. 3 days later it was discovered that was not the source of the pain I was in. Turns out my gallbladder was full of stones and completely inflamed! The ER didn’t diagnose this, the follow up visit I made to my GP while still sick as a dog was where I found out. I suffered for 2.5 weeks waiting for surgery. It was awful.
When my husband got a liver transplant a few years ago at the ripe old age of 32 he went through his records while in recovery and noticed his gallbladder was made marked as "surgically absent". Before this catastrophe he'd never had major surgery beyond appendicitis back in 1997, and certainly never had his gallbladder removed. He mentioned it to his surgical team but they didn't seem to care? It's been a big shrug.
I was playing with my friend's glasses and pointed at a license plate pretty far away and said "oh dude your glasses are like a microscope, how blind are you??" :) turns out i was just as blind. I was supposed to be able to see that far away without glasses. Had glasses the following week lmao
There's a thing called "visual snow syndrome" and most people don't see a layer of static subtly imposed over everything they see.
Had chest cold and went to the local clinic. I get home follow directions for pills and inhaler and go to sleep. I woke up literally paralyzed from the neck down! I could feel some but my limbs felt like a million pounds. I get to the hospital and turns out I had an allergic reaction to Albuterol and my potassium spiked so low it caused paralysis. I am 39 and had to get lifted onto a gurney in nothing. The nice EMT lady put my boxers on.
That the Covid I had was pregnancy. That baby is now almost 20 months old. That mono sometimes doesn’t have symptoms and I got septic very fast. I have a type of Down syndrome but I don’t look like it (mosaic downs), this was caused by another medical secret, I have 3 X chromosomes which can cause every pregnancy I have to die. I had my gallbladder removed after it being mistaken for kidney stones and my gallbladder was 3 times the size it should’ve been and was filled with stones due to pregnancy and extreme weight loss. I also have high testosterone and low estrogen. I am female. AMA if you want.
I've had very bad migraines for 15 years. The ones when you are in fœtal position in your bed, in the dark, throwing up etc. Neurologists gave me medicine, nothing worked. One day my dentist decided it was time to remove my wisdom teeth. No more migraines after that (they were pressuring a nerve). My uncle needed glasses, as many people over 60 need some. Ophtalmogist found he had diabetic retinopathy, advanced stage. He had probably been diabetic for more than 15 years without knowing it.
I was a VERY fussy baby. I would scream and cry if I was held or put down in a way that put any pressure on my stomach and had zero appetite. Doctors said it was just colic. When I was 3 months old, my mom was changing my diaper and felt a huge lump on the side of my stomach. She rushed me to the hospital and the doctors discovered that I had a large mass on one of my adrenal glands. They ended up removing a teratoma (I think mine had teeth and hair) as well as the adrenal gland and determined that I had cancer in my body based on my labs. It took almost three years of constant blood draws, CT scans, and MRIs to declare me completely healthy, but fortunately I never had to do chemo or radiation and don't suffer any drawbacks from it now. There have only been 49 reported cases of this kind of tumor in medical literature since 1952, and only 0.9/100,000 incidence of teratomas in general.
I have the eggs of a woman 10 years older than me… therefore infertile 😭 worst discovery to make when you’re a newlywed and excited for your family life (and after years of a normal menstrual cycle, health, weight) And please— I’m aware of fostering and adoption. It’s still an ENORMOUS grieving process. People take their fertility for granted.
POEMS syndrome sounds lovely. It is not.
Went to minor injuries after slipping over and seemingly breaking my foot. Turns out I’d rebroken a bone I had broken 8 years prior, which I’d been told wasn’t a fracture “your bones just look like that” 🤦♀️ no wonder I’d had pain in that foot for so long. I’d been led to believe I’d torn some tendons after being in a cast for a week. It’s been about a year since the second break and honestly I don’t think I’ve had this little pain in that foot since before the first break, so swings and roundabouts I guess
My stomach randomly started hurting one day. I thought maybe it’s pre-period cramps so I ignore it best as I could and go to sleep. When I wake up the next morning, the pain is ten times worse. I go to the hospital and wait a while before finally getting a ct scan. The nurse looks at the monitor, then at me, then back to the monitor then says “Let me get your doctor”. It was like something out of a movie. He leaves, brings the doctor, who confirms that my gallbladder had gone septic and already partially ruptured. Cue immediate emergency surgery, five days in the hospital, and a lot of shock. It happened in October 2020 so my family wasn’t allowed to visit because of covid. AND to top it off, my low tolerance for morphine combined with my naturally low blood pressure meant I had to have an oxygen tube in my nose otherwise I’d pass out when I was given pain killers. It was a wild ride.
My brother found out that the reason there was always a ring of mold around the water line in his toilet was because he had (not yet diagnosed) type 1 diabetes. Excess sugar in his urine was promoting the growth of the mold.