Tanzania!: Dang-it Chanel, why did you tell Africa to bring it?

So…this week was quite the adventure! I mean, how many people can say that they had surgery in a third-world country on Friday the 13^th? : ) Haha…

For those of you who don’t know the full story yet here it is:

For the past month and a half I have been having these weird pains on my left lower back, side, and stomach. These pains would hit at random times and only last around an hour. We had no idea what they were but narrowed our suspicions down to either an ovarian cyst or kidney stones. Last week on Tuesday after I got home from a day in town the pain started again…so I curled up to wait it out. After an hour I expected it to go away but it didn’t, then two hours passed and I began to worry. After three hours I was just ticked. By four hours I was throwing up and couldn’t keep down any pain medication. I was in the worst pain I had ever felt. Looking back I probably looked like a crazy person because I couldn’t sit still and was just rolling around my bed trying to figure out a solution. At one point Heather brought me up a piece of bread and some pain pills to see if that would help any. Well, I tried to eat a bite of bread but like I said, I couldn’t keep anything down. I got up to go throw up off of the porch and the next thing I know I was laying on the floor with Chanel, Heather, Heidi, and a few others looking down on me. The first thing I thought was “you are kidding me” and the second thing was “poor Chanel.” So, we have had quite the summer here with Team Tanzania. We have had lots of medical emergencies and our country director Chanel has witnessed way too many people pass out. Anyway, I woke up and my hands were numb and kept on going stiff which was super weird and scared everyone. I guess Heather was worried I choked on the bread but I think I just passed out from the pain and the lack of food and water in my system. Well, we called our driver friend Loth and he took me straight to a hospital in Arusha. They gave me and I.V., ran some tests, and shot me up with some pain medicine. Ahhh I was so secretly thankful I passed out so that I could get some pain medication! So me, Heather, and Chanel spent the night at the hospital and I was released the next day. I was diagnosed with a urinary tract infection and sent home with some pills for that. We knew it wasn’t that though, so I went and got an ultrasound at a women’s clinic some of my teammates volunteered at for a while. She found a cyst that was around 10 cm on my left ovary and that she wanted me to go to another place to get this confirmed. She said if they confirmed it then she would recommend I go home immediately. So we headed to the x-ray center where I had to have another ultrasound. Ugh. Ultrasounds are not fun let me tell you. Especially because drinking 6-8 cups of water to fill up my bladder hurts when there is already 10 cm of who knows what filling up my stomach! Anyway, this doctor found the cyst and confirmed the prior diagnosis. So we headed back to the women’s clinic and right when we got there I threw up and my pain became unbearable! In the long run, this pain is what saved my summer! : ) The doctor at this clinic said it would be too dangerous to have me fly home and that I needed surgery as soon as possible. We decided that Nairobi, Kenya would be the safest bet so we arranged transportation and I headed there with Chanel and Heather. That night at the Nairobi hospital I got another ultrasound, was told that I needed surgery as soon as possible because a cyst my size is very dangerous, and was also told by some other doctors that surgery would be a last resort because my cyst isn’t that dangerous. Yeah, we were just as confused as you probably are right now. But we scheduled a consultation appointment for the next day and spent the night at a hotel. The consultation the next day went much more smoothly and the doctors we met with were awesome. They went through my whole history with me and helped us come to the decision that surgery was my best bet. I was really excited because I wanted the pain to go away! Seriously, looking back I am surprised at how not-nervous I was to have strangers slice into me! But at the time I honestly would have done anything to get that painful twisting water balloon out of me! Ok this story is getting long…so basically I had surgery the next day at 6:00 and everything went great! I am back in Arusha now, taking it easy while my stitches heal. My team has been so awesome through this all, especially Heather and Chanel who spent so much time taking care of me. We projected the DVD of my surgery onto our wall the other night and enjoyed that as a team…who knew we would all become so close? : ) I don’t have time to read through and edit this post so you will have to forgive me if it doesn’t make sense! I just wanted to update my blog quickly while I am here at the internet café!

Here are some pics! : )