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Somehow I injured my neck while swimming. It wasn't bad at first, hardly pain at all, so I kept swimming.
A couple days later, at a meet, during warmup, I go to practice my backstroke start, and PAIN. PAIN PAIN PAIN. I got out, and found my father, who tried to get me to stretch it out. BAD IDEA. MORE! PAIN! I couldn't move my neck, back, hips, or anything that would joggle my spine, for about an hour. It was horrible, and very scary.
A very close second or tie is when I got my wisdom teeth out and the initial pain medication wore off.
And somewhere in there was the super-hot day one summer when I was working and the airconditioner was busted, and I have having some of the worst period cramps I've ever had. I threw up, but fortunately by then I'd gotten someone to come in and relieve me. I then went home and yearned to die.
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Breaking my ankle was the worst pain I'd had at that point in my life, but migranes topped that out. I think I can do better in my life, though.
Posts: 4816 | Registered: Apr 2003
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I would love to say having my breasts squished as flat as a pancake (mammogram - today), but really, it wasn't as bad as other things I've experienced. Like. . .
Cramps. I've had hell periods since the very beginning. They were miserable to the point of curling up in a ball and sobbing like a baby. Pain killers have NEVER touched the pain until a month or so ago and ketchupqueen told me about some drugs she takes. I'm much happier now.
Or I could mention my broken & dislocated little toes. Broke the right one three times, the left one twice, and the worst break involved several dislocations and many breaks to the point of shattered bones. Local anaesthetic made me feel like decking the guy who gave it to me. It felt like torture, and yeah, I would have whimpered if I hadn't been screaming. Crushed the bones in a friend's hand.
Then there were the migraines. Been getting them since I was four or five, and they were at their worst when I was a teenager. From when I was 16 to about 18 or 19, I had a migraine every single stinking day, and some of them lasted for up to two weeks. The worst ones involved me being blind, or deaf, or unable to understand English (verbal or written), or left me partially paralyzed, or vomiting non-stop, or . . . Drugs didn't work particularly well on them, and the neuros never did figure out why I had them, other than I didn't have a brain tumour or aneurysms. And the migraines would tie with . . .
Gallbladder attacks. Uncontrollable vomiting, painful spasms, those blasted attacks lasted for 12 or thirteen hours at a time. By the time my gallbladder was finally removed, I'd lost a lot of hair and my skin was peeling off due to the no-fat diet I'd been on. And my skin had taken on a rather deathly looking shade of grey-green.
Ugh. Yeah, I don't mind the mammogram so much anymore. Posts: 8355 | Registered: Apr 2003
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posted
I've been avoiding posting here because this hurts just to talk about.
One night, when I was about 16 or so, I woke up around 1am with searing pain in my right testicle. This didn't feel like being kicked in the crotch, more like a vice grip was being slowly tighted on the testicle. Thinking maybe I'd slept in a bad position, pinching it with my leg or something, I shifted around in bed to try to relieve the pain. Nothing worked, it just kept hurting. I got out of bed, wincing as I did, and tried walking around a bit. That hurt too. After about a half hour, which felt like much longer, I decided that something had to be done as it didn't seem to be going away on its own.
The best way that I can describe just how much this really hurt is simply: I woke my parents up to tell them that my testicle hurt. Really, imagine yourself as a shy teenage boy. Anything to do with your parents is embarrassing enough, and the whole sex thing is sort of an awkward concept too. I'd seriously contemplated dialing 911 as a less-traumatic alternative. Anyway, after an explanation nearly as horrible as the pain itself, mom got down the big Family Medical Book and started asking about symptoms. The most likely match was that the testicle had rotated within the scrotum, twisting the tubes and veins connecting it to the rest of the body.
Okay, simple enough fix: Rotate the testicle back where it belongs, right? Only... which way is that? You can't tell which way it's twisted. 50/50 chance, and I had to try something at this point. I retreat to the bathroom and cautiously, gingerly try rotating my agonizingly painful testicle. AHH! That hurt worse! So it must be the other way, fine. Only turning it the other way hurt too!
Suffice to say, through much swearing, pain, tears, trial and error everything thing eventually got better. The whole experience lasted maybe 2 hours. The really horrifying thing about my story though, guys? This just happened one night. No apparent cause or injury, just waking up with a terrible pain in the right testicle.
--Enigmatic (Also has a story about fiberglass insulation, but will save it for now.)
Posts: 2715 | Registered: Apr 2005
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Only twice in my entire adult life have I been in so much pain that I cried.
1) I cut off a good portion of my left thumb -- just below the nail -- at a Christmas party. The after-hours emergency clinic to which I went cauterized the cut with what looked like a soldering iron. Without painkillers.
2) A few months later, I got a terrible earache as a consequence of a bad head cold. It was well after hours, and my insurance didn't cover emergency rooms, so I tried to sleep it off. I couldn't get to bed after several hours, so finally hopped into the car around 2:30AM to try to find a clinic. As I pulled onto the highway, the pressure got bad enough that it actually forced loose the clogged tube that I'd had in that ear since my childhood, ripping a large hole in my eardrum.
I nearly blacked out, I'm ashamed to say, but was able to pull over and park the car before actually biting the steering wheel to avoid screaming.
------
I've broken a few bones and had a few nasty cuts in my time, but none of my actual injuries ever came close to those two in terms of sheer "ouch-itude." And I'm actually quite sheepish about that, since both of those were really quite minor.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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When I was 12 I broke my arm.. That wasn't the part that hurt.
You see, I was deathly afraid of shots so I wouldn't let the doctor give me a shot to knock me out before they set the bone. After I-don't-know-how-long of them twisting my arm around trying to set it and me screaming at the top of my lungs, I finally consented to the shot.
When testicles twist, they always twist inward, so you untwist them outwards. That is, if you ever have to untwist yourself again, twist the right one clockwise or the left one counterclockwise (toward the outside of the hip either way).
I remember it like this: if I'm kneeling in front of someone, I untwist like I'm opening the pages of a book.
Ouch! Ouch! That's a nightmare.
[And it is a surgical emergency -- a testicle without blood supply can be lost pretty fast.]
Posts: 14017 | Registered: May 2000
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That is, I think, what happened to Robert's testicle before he was even born. *wince*
My worst pain ever was either viral meningitis or the spinal headaches I got from the spinal tap that diagnosed the meningitis. It kind of went together.
Only time I've ever been in so much pain that I vomitted. Nothing wrong with my stomach at all, just a neurological thing.
Posts: 9293 | Registered: Aug 2000
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And I just realized how weird it is that untwisting testicles is part of my skillset.
(Gee, do think that would go over well in one of those 5-minute-date thingies? )
Tom, I forgot about one of my ear infections. That was excruciating. The pain is usually from the stretch -- once it popped through, did the pain stop? When my eardrum spontaneously ruptured, it was such a relief. When I got another ear infection some 30 yrs later, I seriously considered trying to pierce it with a spinal needle. (Uh, don't do this at home. *grin) It was that bad. I think it really was the worst.
I always remember that when I see littl'uns with ear infections. They can be really really painful.
Posts: 14017 | Registered: May 2000
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I have funny-shaped sinuses, inherited from my father, and am prone to both severe sinus infections and ear infections, even as an adult. I've had 7 since I turned 18-- 5 of which were before I turned 20. I've finally learned what works for me in terms of prevention. Luckily. It's made my life a lot better.
Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
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Well, I could write pages about this one, unfortunately. I won't bore you, though. I'll just say, recovering from 2 back surgeries...although I can't really say I've ever recovered from the second one. *sigh* Be nice to your back, friends! Once you ruin it, it's gonna be a long, hard ride.
Posts: 68 | Registered: Jul 2005
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Oh, poor Enigmatic! I just cringed when I read your post. And after reading what ClaudiaTherese had to say...wow, I'm just glad that everything worked out OK.
Posts: 68 | Registered: Jul 2005
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I'm a little hesitant to say this, because I'm not absolutely sure, but I believe that when testicular torsion is fixed surgically, the testicle is affixed to the wall of the scrotum so that it can't retwist.
Our beloved Enigmatic may be at risk for this happening again. *ouch
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CT - I've been told that as well. I had a male friend who had the whole twisted testicle experience and had surgery for it.
Posts: 8355 | Registered: Apr 2003
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