What a great day for kidney stones. The rain was lashing down like a caravan holiday, as I lay in the bath and thought about the dull ache in my side. Hello friend, I remember you well.
Can a pain be good? Perhaps…
This one was, at least at the start. I could feel its warmth inside of me, a gentle throb that meant me no harm. I get it from time to time and ever since it was diagnosed as kidney stones it has bothered me less. Sometimes knowing helps you deal with things.
It was a gentle reminder that I was alive, human and imperfect and the heat of the bathwater was soothing. Yet I should have taken more notice. Like a demanding child I knew there was a chance it would get worse and sure enough, as the evening wore on the pain grew in intensity. It went from good to bad. This time it did mean me harm.
When the time came, I tried to go to bed. I even took a water bottle to try and assuage the pain but to no avail. It is always at the darkest point in the night when pain seems most intense, it is the same with toothache. I don’t know if that’s because there are no other distractions, but sure enough by 2 o’clock I was downstairs swallowing any pain killers I could lay my hands on. Eventually I got back to bed and managed to catch up on some sleep, waking up pain free and my troubles already a fading memory.
A few days later and a sharp pain in my groin told me I had passed a stone. That is that over, until the next time.
The human body is an amazing thing, so complicated that at times, I wonder how it ever works at all. The only time we stop to think about our own frailty is when it starts to fail and we teeter on the edge of uncertainty. As someone much wiser once said to me, ‘there is nothing good about getting old’. I’m not sure he was right but when it comes to your body he certainly had something.
Thoughts from a Guerrilla Worker 