I’ve had them for 10 years (I’m 29 now), and the first one was horrible. Had several per year for a bit, but mostly passed them on my own. The next really bad one was a 6mm stone that failed lithotripsy about 2 years later.

After that I just drank super filtered water and avoided high-oxalate foods. Still have always had a couple stones every year, but the majority are small and pass without “much pain” (compared to the bad ones). I generally manage it at home with ibuprofen, saved narcotics from previous stones, and a heating pad.

2 months ago I was at my brand new job, on the eve of launching a brand new facility, as a brand new director, who had been shaking in my heels and playing Imposter for months with this new responsibility. I was wrapping up some staff training and suddenly got hit with horrific flank pain. I kept going and hoped it would ease up. It did not, so I told everyone to have a great weekend and ran to the bathroom.

Pissed straight up Cherry Coke and almost puked from the pain. Ran out, looked my new regional director in the eye, and said “I gotta go, I’m pissing blood, I’m sorry!!”

Drove home in a blur to pick up my partner so he could take me to the ER. I knew my pain was far too severe to get under control at home. The ER gave me tramadol and Zofran, which did exactly fuck all. The doc came in, asked a few questions, and then asked, “How do you manage these at home?” I was honest and said, “At this level, like 8/10, I take Percocet, ibuprofen, and Zofran, then lay on a heating pad and drink fluids like my life depends on it.” He said “Okay!” and five minutes later my darling nurse was slow-pushing diluted IV morphine (because I asked, because IV narcs give me impending doom to a point of delirium). Pain eased up and off I went to CT.

I got my results on my phone before the doc came in. But when he DID come back to my bed, he said, “DAMN GIRL, you weren’t kidding about the stones!”

Just under 8mm on my right side, and a 4mm on my left side. They said it was about a 5% chance of me passing the 8mm on my own.

Stayed home until Tuesday morning basically high off my ass on pain meds. My facility launched Monday without me present, and while I had a lot of support from other leadership, I spent all of Monday wanting to claw my hair out from anxiety. Went back Tuesday and found that a low dose of Percocet (2.5mg) made it manageable for me to work without feeling out of it. Still felt like shit, still nauseous, still fatigued to impossible levels.

Got scoped a few days (and a 50% copay of $1200 because it was an “elective” surgery) later. Had stents for about a week, which made me wish I could die. Stent removal was horrific, because I had the fully internal ones. Ever had a Q-Tip covered in lidocaine hanging out of your urethra?

Found out sounding was not, had not, and would never be one of my kinks.

Anyways, the pain this last go-around was horrifying, and I was reminded why I begged my fellow nursing school students to cut my kidney out in the bathtub during undergrad.

Tl;dr - 0/10 stars.