What's the most pain you've ever experienced?

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
21

googles staghorn kidney stone

YIKES!

I hear that kidney stones and gall stones are similar in their insane painfulness. The doctors at the hospital initially assumed I had kidney stones until they took the MRI and found the gall stones. They saw no inflammation, so they thought the surgery could wait until they did another special test and found a severe infection. Then when they actually cut me open, they said parts of my gallbladder were blackened, dead (I have pictures. It’s black.) The surgeon said it looked like I’d been having attacks for years, and while I certainly had all kinds of unexplained chronic stomach pain before that, that one acute attack last year is the most ill I’ve ever been.

When I told my Grandma about my gallbladder problems she said she had a gallbladder attack… when she was pregnant. They couldn’t operate so she had to wait three months to deliver before they could remove her gallbladder. :eek:

I could barely handle one day.

Another Doper friend of mine (who may pop in) had kidney stones the day before her scheduled hysterectomy. At least it made the surgery pain seem not so bad. :frowning:

'Nuff said.

22

My lymphangiogram. Excruciating.

23

Gall stones, without a doubt. I had been having a few mild episodes over the previous months but nothing too bad. Felt like gas to be honest. Then one morning at about 2am I woke up in excruciating pain. Rolled around on the couch sobbing until 9am when my wife woke up and politely suggested I should go to the hospital and was an idiot for not waking her.

I was doubled over in pain at the emergency desk and they took me right in and pumped me full of dilaudid. That was the greatest feeling of relief I’ve ever felt. A few tests and confirmation it was my gall bladder. The doctor said I could have emergency surgery that night or wait a few weeks on a waiting list. Stupid question.

Seven pm has me going under. A few hours later I’m ensconced in my hospital room and the doctor is telling me that my gall bladder was the worst looking he’d seen in some time. I had a drain installed and spent 3 days in the hospital. Not a fun feeling when they pulled that drain either.

24

I was 14. Big toe, right foot. Both sides of the nail were ingrown. Went to sawbones to get it fixed. He put the anesthesia in wrong and was working on a “live” digit. Fun times.

Fortunately, I don’t remember how painful slamming my forehead onto the sidewalk was; the concussion knocked me out for several hours. I was 8.

25

Worst physical pain was the aftermath of a severe case of food poisoning. After about 36 hours of constant vomiting and diarrhea, I collapsed in exhaustion, thinking it was finally all over. Not so! Every joint in my body hurt; could barely move. It took me about a month to get back to normal.

I was, actually, very lucky. I’ve since heard that the aftereffects of food poisoning can sometimes be permanent.

26

Yeah, that drain was the worst thing about post-op. The guy pulling it out made it a point to try to engage me in conversation while he did it. I was not fooled.

I came out of post-op in utter relief, though. The post-op pain was nothing by comparison. It only really hurt when I moved. The biggest challenge was learning how to sit up without using my ab muscles. I got stuck on my bed at least once. :stuck_out_tongue:

27

Physically:
short duration of pain - dentist hit a nerve and didn’t tell me. I later found out that “blinding pain” is not a hyperbolic expression - you literally can’t see anything but white. Fortunately, that was over with when I got pain meds just a few hours later.
medium duration of pain - chemical burned a cornea when I was eight. I was in agony overnight/early the next morning until I could see a eye doctor.
long duration of pain - I went roller-skating the night I graduated high school and wasn’t good at it. I wiped out. sitting and standing hurt horribly for weeks. I’d never experienced pain with that much of a pressure element to it before.

Mental:
Well, tomorrow’s six months since my mom died…

28

When I broke my hip the xray technician required me to pull my right knee to my chest so that he could get the right angle. That is when I discovered that if you lay flat on your back and cry, the tears pool in your ears.

29

Physical: A root canal during which the anesthesia did not take. I will never forget it.

Mental: I guess I’m fortunate, nothing comes to mind.
mmm

30

I had a very conservative dentist when I was a teenager. He never seemed to use enough novocaine.

That, except on a vasectomy. Rather than get another shot and wait 10-15 minutes to marinate through with my stuff hanging out I kept my mouth shut and drifted in and out of consciousness for the 400 year long procedure. (I wasn’t keeping track, that’s just my best estimate)

31

Probably the time I had strep throat. My throat was so sore that it felt like a bullet had gone in my mouth and come out my ear. Terrible pain.

Also a humorous story: My brother was a child, and he decided to play with baking soda and vinegar. He put it in a plastic bag and waited for the bag to pop. Some of it flew into his eye, and it kept burning. I have never heard anyone scream so loud. It was one of those things that sucked at the time but was kind of funny later.

32

Another vote for Gall stones. I’ve never had kidney stones to compare it with, but I could literally not sleep, the pain was so bad.

Mental would be the bullying I underwent in middle school as a 12 year old. Didn’t wreck my life, but it didn’t make it any easier.

33

the day my gallbladder decided it was going to kill me

For about 4-5 years I had the whole upse t stomach nausea thing … they thought I had an bleeding ulcer or hernia (I was like 19 or so mind you) I didn’t eat certain things drank antacid by the bottle …

Well one night I had 2 things I usually avoided … spicy clams in sauce which was spicy too …I thought I had gas so bad that I quit playing my online game and went to bed doubled over … well an hour after than is when the puking and serious paid started … I tried what usually helped baking soda and water …I just couldn’t keep it down

So still thinking it was just food related I walked to a 7-11 (in the above condition) type of place I lived by and bought some tums they helped a bit but a couple of hours later the puking started again … a roommate woke up and asked me if I was ok and woke up my relative who took me ot the er …

Now after 3 hours of non stop spewage and a totally grossed out er they moved me to the front of the line and after the usual er exam they dinged me with morphiene and I drank this and that to keep it down

Went ot the body scan thing and they said "ok its just gallstones … well get them dissovled and youll go home tomorrow… the pain by this point was indescribable so I sat in the er getting a morph drip in my arm …by now I’m out of it really but when the nurse game me my 20th cup of juice I drank it made a face and just puked all over her for about2 minutes

She sighed wrinkled her nose as I apologized profusely but them she grabbed a sealed cup scraped a good amount of the chunks of her shirt and sent it to the lab with a emergency tag on it 30 minutes later I was being wheele ot a room and I asked what was up the nurse whom sent the cup off says " well were going to get you some antibiotic type of stuff until your surgery

I was like surgery ? She says “yeah your gallbladder is so poisoned its dissolving and letting gangrene go in your system that’s why it smelled so bad earlier … the poison was coming out with parts of the gallbladder” …if I had waited in the er an hour or two longer id of been dead

so surgery had been successful but I had to stay for a bit to make sure all the poison was out of my system

My surgeon came in about 5 am poking and pushing where id been operated on and it hurt so badly that I woke up …he then ripped off the taped on bandage and argued with me about being on ssi after I told him … I passed out again after he left and I told the nurse about it and her on the orderly told me he was an contract from out of town and every one thought he was a dick

But for the next week in a half I was in and out of consciousness … one reason I found out was my dad made them change my pain med because pure morphiene wasn’t a good thing so I had a few things goin on at the same time

now if you look up the "worst injury " threads youll see the time I tried to cook testes ramen involuntarily…

Oh and asking the doc that I went to for a follow up about the upset stomach and such … he said it might have been a slow leak and if I still had it . I was to go back so they could finish flushing the poison out of my system… but I didn’t have an upset anything for 2 years after …

34

Physical; Appendicitis, felt like that sequence from Alien when the chestburster pops out of John Hurt, the doctors misdiagnosed it the first trip to the ER, sent me home saying they weren’t sure and come back if it gets worse, less than 12 hours later I was back, another batch of tests confirmed it, went under the knife, the hey got it out laprascopically, just in time, had I waited any longer it would have ruptured.

And even stranger, they said the appendix was deeper and further back than normal…

Psychological; watching my Dad wither and die from complications from chronic Lyme Disease, seeing a vigorous, vital outdoorsman reduced to a pain wracked bedridden invalid, slowly losing use of his limbs due to paralytic problems, undergoing massive personality changes for the worst, and eventually slipping into a comatose vegetative state before finally passing away, what made Dad Dad died long before his body did.

If I wasn’t already an atheist then, seeing Dad slowly and painfully degrade would have pushed me to atheism hardcore…

Dad was a deacon at their church for a long time, you’d think “god” would take better care of his representatives

35

I’m sorry, MacTech. That sounds awful.

36

Physical: hit by a truck while riding a motorcycle. When they asked me where I hurt I said “My leg! My @#$% leg!” Then they asked me where I hurt besides my leg. I thought for a moment and said that my shoulder hurt a little and my mouth felt funny. Final damage: one broken femur, some quadriceps muscle lost and damage to the femoral artery and sciatic nerve, also a separated shoulder and three broken teeth.

37

I was in the hospital for two weeks following my ruptured appendix. Nobody knew I was there, and my poor cat was left alone in my apartment. When I was finally able to get out of bed, I got dressed and walked out. The drain was still in me, and I had to go to a private surgeon to remove it and to repair what the hospital fucked up. Two years later, my body rejected the final stitch and the incision closed.

This was before law suits were common. Today, I’d be rich.

38

Child birth, with a spinal headache coming in as a very close second.

39

Bad spinal block after abdominal surgery… Instead of going into my spinal column, the meds went into the fat layer beneath my skin. Huge blisters, open weeping sores that took months to heal. Still have nasty scars and nerve damage. Breaking every bone in my foot didn’t hurt like this.

Mentally: My mother’s an emotionally abusive narcissist.

40

I tend to put off seeking medical care, assuming I’ll get better without intervention.

When my gallbladder went bad I was up three days straight in constant pain. I kept thinking if I was patient it would stop. When I saw that the whites of my eyes were yellow I called a doctor. After examining me he called an ambulance.

When I had unstable angina I thought the pain I was feeling almost every night was GERD or some other digestive problem, because I assumed cardiac pain that bad would kill me. Since the attacks “only” lasted 15 minutes or so, I assumed antacids would help. After about a month, the episodes were becoming more frequent and I knew there was something bad going on.

By the time I saw my doctor, I’d had a small heart attack and didn’t realize it. The stent procedure was quick and simple.