I thought it was GERD, it was actually appendicitis…
I thought I’d share my story as I am 1 day post-op appendectomy and wanted to see if anyone could relate since I am new here.
Around early September, I woke up in the middle of the night with a sharp pain in my stomach. That night, I had cooked dinner for myself and just assumed that I was having a GERD flare up. It is possible that there was some type of overlap, but it felt similar to my previous episodes so I shrugged it off… for over a week.
And boy was I wrong.
I had central stomach pain that radiated to my lower back and pelvic area. I was barely eating anything. I was nauseous as hell. I remember seeing my favorite foods and gagging so hard. I struggled to sit down and get up. I work two demanding jobs, and as someone who fears calling off, I continued to work through the pain and took Pepto Bismol in the mean time.
It had been 4 days in when I decided to go to urgent care because I was not sleeping or eating and they sent me to a ED. The doctors there had also assumed my GERD was the issue because of how I presented so I was treated with a GI cocktail and IV fluids for dehydration, but obviously that did nothing.
Usually when I go to an ED for my GERD episodes, they confirm it with imaging so this was red flag #1 that they did not do more.
A few more days went by and I began to feel so weak, which is when I knew something was off. I couldn’t keep anything down anymore, even liquids and meds so I went to a different ED. They did a CT scan and as you can imagine, it was appendicitis.
Every doctor I encountered thought it was so weird that my symptoms did not match the typical appendicitis patient, but that thing was huge and forming pockets of abscess. The infection even spread to my colon so I was initially hospitalized and treated with antibiotics, with a plan for an interval appendectomy in November when the inflammation was calm and it was safer to operate without the risk of removing part of my colon.
Long story short, I had another unexpected episode this week and now I am recovering from my lap appy 🫂❤️🩹.
Listen to your body the first time. I grew up with hypochondria and was never taken serious because of my fears but that does not mean ignore any signs your body gives you that something is off.