Fountain of Blood in the Shape of a Girl

[rinue]

Woke up, called in to work, went to an urgent care center, and spent the rest of the day drinking juice and distracting myself with unchallenging videogames.

I think when people, especially men, hear "urinary tract infection," it sounds like one of those diffuse cyclical women's problems like ovulation pain, something ladies just deal with and complain about. Or maybe like a sinus infection or something that just makes you feel under the weather for a bit. It even has that cute "UTI" shorthand. I don't know; maybe there are women for whom it's just kind of itchy or something and they have a low fever and drink extra water for a while. Could be; it's not like they'd discuss it with me. For me, a UTI, of which I've fortunately only ever had three, goes like this:

I wake up and feel like something is wrong, but I don't know what. Since I have just woken up, I go to the bathroom, where everything still seems normal, except for this feeling that something is wrong. I am seized with a strong and as-yet inexplicable compulsion to never leave the toilet, although there is not a clear reason to remain on the toilet. I am overcome with panic in the seconds it takes to go find a book, and the panic only subsides when I return to the toilet. It still seems nothing is wrong beyond knowing that something is wrong, and of course crippling anxiety at the idea of rising from the toilet. 30 minutes into this, I start wanting a doctor, but still don't want to leave the toilet, and anyway don't know what to say when listing symptoms, because "something is wrong" is, let's admit it, nondescriptive.

Three hours in, I start pissing blood and shaking uncontrollably. At this point, unless a doctor can see me immediately, I have to go to an emergency room, because the one time I waited until eight hours had passed, I wound up with kidney damage. When I get to a doctor, I am prescribed the same drug used to treat anthrax exposure, and an orange dye which has a side effect of working as a painkiller for the bladder. (Is this cool? Yes. Being a dye, it also dyes my urine and my tears bright orange. Chemistry huttah!)

It's never been clear what triggers this, because it comes out of nowhere once every three or four years during a day or week no different from the days or weeks in which it doesn't happen. I also don't know why it's so aggressive. It fortunately responds very quickly to treatment. Ciro was kind about holding my hand, fieldmarshalling a medical response, and making sure I got dressed.

Anyway, today I've pissed yellow, pissed clear, pissed brown, pissed pink, pissed red, and pissed orange. It's a carnival up in here.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Well, that is disturbing. I'm glad it doesn't happen terribly often, because it sounds horrid.

On the flip-side, because I am the girl who once called her bloke into the bathroom to check out the amazing magenta colour of her beetroot poop (he's never fallen for it again), the concept of pissing orange strikes me as fascinating.

treehavn

[rinue]

Indeed this is one of the reasons I like beets so much. (The other is just that I like beets.) Bright orange is fantastic. The house has five toilets in it, and I keep switching around so I can see it in different shapes and lighting conditions.

[liquidmorpheme.livejournal.com]

Point — men are perfectly susceptible to UTIs, and any who think it's to be lumped in with "female troubles" deserves to have one.
--

Ciro

[rinue]

Oh of course, but it's much rarer due to urethra length. Whereas I am sure I have heard at least one person say she gets a UTI every month, and I assume she didn't mean this in the way I mean it and that there is a "mild" version; otherwise, the internet forums (stupid internet) where people are very blythe and "oh it was a little uncomfortable and I just took cranberry pills" don't make much sense, unless they are a VAST CONSPIRACY. And this is probably the context in which most people place the phrase.

[memoryhouse]

I am glad you are feeling better!

I've had several UTIs. They've all been similar to one another, and all have fallen somewhere in the middle of the spectrum between "mildly uncomfortable. cranberries!" and your experience. They start like yours, and then I have sharp horrible pains in my lower belly and double over and need to piss, badly, always, constantly, but only little reddish drops come out.. And then I go and get drugs, and it is fixed. It's really horrible and I'd never call it mild, but I also didn't feel like my life was in danger.

My sister, on the other hand, once skipped over all the preliminary symptoms, or didn't notice them somehow, all the way to severe kidney infection.

So! I also find it confusing. I think the term UTI covers a multitude of sins.