UXgrrl

Eew, I hate those! I used to get them a lot but blessedly I have not for awhile.

What I do is take ibuprofen and/or tylenol (you can take them together if necessary but ibu lasts longer). That should help with the pain.

Then start drinking. LOTS AND LOTS. As much as you can possibly hold. The more you pee, the better you will feel, and for some reason peeing a volume of liquid is more comfortable than little drops and dribbles.

You can also try cranberry juice (make sure it's real juice, not cranberry DRINK, and get something with as little sugar in it as possible, because sugar irritates the uro tract). Guzzle that like there's no tomorrow. Alternately you can get cranberry juice extract in pill form from the drugstore.

A heating pad works well too, at a time like this. If you start feeling like you have a lower back ache or pain around your bellybutton or lower right side, or start running a fever, go to the ER, because it's something very serious. I recently learned that appendicitis can appear like a UTI for some people.

Good luck!

No shame in staying on the Lortab. I took my percocets fairly religiously for about 5 days after I got home from the hospital. We're all so paranoid about pain meds in our culture that lots of people don't take them when they should so they can rest and heal.

You made it! Now the fun part starts!

Now I sneeze when I am full (crazy huh?)

Not crazy at all! Awhile back I went on a research bender about the vagus nerve when I noticed that I was sometimes getting this feeling of extreme nausea -- watery mouth and everything -- and then I would sneeze, and felt immediately better. Apparently the vagus nerve goes from your head all the way down to your stomach, and some branches go even further into your genitals. This nerve is separate from the normal parasympathetic system and currently there is some weight-loss research being done on the effects of blocking vagus nerve signals from the stomach.

Apparently the whole sneezing-when-nauseous thing is pretty common.