Pee tests and being prodded

I've been getting an intermittent pain in my lower abdomen since last September. It felt like cystitis but didn't respond to over-the-counter remedies and kept coming back. I have done no less than five pee tests at the doctor's. No infection. I have been prodded and poked. I got sent for an ultrasound because of my polycystic ovaries to check they were behaving. They were. I have taken a course of antibiotics 'just in case'. They didn't help. The next step was going to be referral to a urologist.

Early on Sunday morning I had to get up to pee when I would normally have ignored it and gone back to sleep to avoid the risk of waking little man. He didn't wake up, but I did discover a big lump in my groin. (I know you really want to know all this.) It was somewhat alarming. It felt, to me, like quite a big swelling to be going on down there. I eventually convinced myself it was probably just a swollen gland and something to do with the cold I had (still have). I handed the boy to daddy over a cuppa and went to work.

On Monday morning I spent twenty minutes pressing redial to get through to the doc's and got an appointment for that morning. I was prodded and poked. By two doctors. They agreed. I have a hernia. I have an appointment with the surgeons next week. The doctor (he was quite young and had obviously had a course on being nice to patients) wondered how I felt about the fact I had gone in thinking I had a swollen gland and was going out needing surgery and with the knowledge that my innards aren't as inwards as they should be. Er....um. Afterwards, the thing that upset me most was the fact that I had no-one special to tell for a bit of instant sympathy.

I ate a bar of chocolate in work that afternoon and consumed a bottle of Soave spread over Monday and Tuesday nights. I feel just fine now, doctor.