Plank you

Photo by Larisa Birta on Unsplash

This week began with me wincing in pain. 

I should already be feeling some relief now that I started medication, right? Well, if it’s my primary complaint, then there were obvious improvements there. The symptoms that I was having days ago have lessened and I still have another week before my follow-up check-up with my gastroenterologist. 

But what started as an abdominal pain already went on to a full-blown, widespread pain all over my body. Name it: neck, back, legs, shoulders—all throbbing. It seems my body sneakily comes up with something new to torment me every day.

The tricky thing with this is I can’t just take pain relievers or NSAIDs because it’s bad for my stomach. So, for two days I have pain relief patches all over and my Peppermint Oil handy. If I had to take something it’ll be Paracetamol, which might as well be Altoids because it does nothing. 

This can’t be the case for me every single day. I can’t live like this. 

I “gut” an update!

I got the results of my upper abdomen ultrasound last week so let me start with the good news first. 

I have a normal scan for the gallbladder (no gallstones), kidneys, pancreas, spleen, and abdominal aorta. I heaved a sigh of relief knowing that I won’t need to go under the knife after suspecting gallstones earlier.

However, the bad news is I have what they call Nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD). 

I hate my "gut"

I’ve been having this ache in my upper abdomen for more than two weeks now. It started as a dull chest pain just between the breastbone (sternum) and then slowly crawled to the lower ribs just right by the diaphragm. Since I don’t have any other symptoms like fever, difficulty in breathing, vomiting, constipation/diarrhea, or anything that can cause alarm like high blood pressure or fast heart rate, I thought it’s costochondritis which I know will go away on its own. 

But when I felt a sudden tightening on my chest—as if I was having a heart attack—while mopping the floor one night, I went and have it checked last week. 

Photo by Alexander Krivitskiy on Unsplash