Before beginning patrol, I was working doing platoon duties. This included the regular early morning PT, motor pool Monday, rearranging the connex and storage unit, as well as running errands for leadership. Payday activities every other Friday, who doesn’t love some amazing inspections? One motor pool Monday I was feeling pain in my kidney. I knew it was a kidney stone. I had been having the pain since basic training. I even went to sick call once for it. When I was in basic I was just told “You don’t have a kidney stone, you just have some random pain, you’ll get kicked out of the Army if you have a kidney stone, don’t mention it again.” Anyway, nothing was done about it. I had kidney stones in the past and I knew I had one again. I told my team leader, who also just arrived at FT. Hood and had not started working on the road yet either. He asked me if I needed to go to the hospital, I was trying to be all badass, so instead I told him no. I would wait until the end of the duty day to go to the hospital. I had my very first but not my last entanglement with the hospital and their staff.
As usual, I was right, I had a kidney stone. It was small in size however it was painful. I was given a couple of medications and told to see urology. It led to me having two different ureteroscopies by a young Major who was the urologist. The first surgery was unsuccessful and the urologist left a stent in. If you don’t know what a stent is, google it. Essentially it is a long piece of tubing with large coils on both ends. It is placed from your kidney through your ureter to your pee hole. It is placed to prevent blockage or collapse of your ureter. I had stents before, they are even more painful than the kidney stones themselves. Usually in a regular medical situation they pull the stent out a week after surgery, in the medical office, using lidocaine. Instead this was Army medicine, they left a string for it hanging out of my pee hole so that I would have to pull it out myself. I was given antibiotics and told to pull it out in the shower because it would be easier and less painful.
Luckily after the ureteroscopies I was given convalescent leave. The most idiotic part of this leave was the documentation that I had to turn in to the company before it was approved. I did not receive the leave document until the day of surgery. That meant that I had to go to the company and give them the proper documents signed by the doctor, so that my leave could be approved. This violated convalescent leave in every way. Nobody should have to run a bunch of errands after a surgery, but this wouldn’t be my first time, in fact it definitely wasn’t my last time and I will have a lot more to say about that subject later.
Three days after surgery I couldn’t physically handle the pain of the stent anymore. The recommendation was that I leave it in for a week, however I called the doctor and he said it was okay if I removed it. I hopped into the shower, anxious to get rid of this immense pain. I began the journey of pulling out this stent, I worked myself up, called myself a bad-ass, and started to pull. I got it about halfway out and I thought I was about to pass out in the shower. Seriously a stent is about 10 inches in length, just think about it. I almost threw up from the pain, I had this thing half hanging out of me and I knew I had to get the rest out. I worked myself up again and finally was able to pull it out completely. I felt accomplished, nauseous, and I was doubled over in pain. The medications definitely were not helping in any way.
Even worse was the fact that the doctor couldn’t reach the stone and it wasn’t removed during surgery, he failed. Months later there would be a second failed ureteroscopy done by the same doctor. The second surgery was supposed to be a lithotripsy, where they use shock waves to break up the stone in hopes that it’s easier to pass. However, while I was unconscious the doctor did not like the way the stone looked on X-ray, so he decided to perform another ureteroscopy, once again leaving in a stent that I would have to pull out myself. I was devastated and still in pain.
I consulted with the urologist again and he suggested that maybe not all of my pain was kidney stone related, so he was going to put in a referral to a pain clinic for my back. This would lead to so much hassle and angst for me as well as causing an issue between the brigade surgeon (the doctor for my company, my PCP), and myself. There’s a long story to go through between myself and the brigade surgeon. It’s not a good one, but once again that will be for another time.
After convalescent leave, while I was on profile, I was sent back to the company for platoon duty while I continued to heal from surgery. Before I could even start motor pool Monday I was told by the platoon sergeant that he was trying to get me into a combat lifesavers course because he did not want me to be hanging around the burnouts at the company. I went to the lifesavers course and they weren’t going to teach it due to lack of soldiers enrolled. However they found two younger soldiers and had them attend the course so that I could attend it. Let it be known that it also had to be approved that I could attend due to being on a profile. A typical qualification for the end of a combat lifesaving course is that you run a course in full gear, carry a rifle and pretend to shoot downrange, they also shoot simulation rounds at you so you do it under stress. This is a timed event, a dummy body has to be dragged and lifted, etc. I was on a no run, jump, march profile. Which included no handling of a firearm, I could not wear my gear at all, nor could I drag the dummy. So the course was extremely modified for me, by the day qualification/certification came around the SSG in charge of the course asked me where my gear was and asked me why I wasn’t lying down fire (fake shooting at the enemy while kneeling). This man knew I was on a profile, so here we are on the last day of the course and he finally asks to read it. He had already approved me to take the course. We were indoors, there was no simulation fire, just graders (medics), myself and the dummy. This SSG huffed and puffed, got pissed off, asked me why I was even there, then had me run the qualification.The best part was he had to drag the dummy for me, then turn it over when I applied the chest seals, then get it onto the litter. I passed the course and submitted my paperwork.
Once again some cookie cutter training and another giant joke. I should never have been cleared to take that course, you’re supposed to be at a heightened stress level by being shot at with sim rounds, you’re supposed to be in full gear to protect you from that as well as to simulate a real life situation. Instead I was just in my normal uniform, on narcotics, trying not to break my profile. All to pacify the platoon sergeant so that I could be learning something instead of being around the burnouts at the company. I hope it was worth it to my leadership.
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