Mar
12
2021
Today was the day I was scheduled for my sonogram exam. I was not scared and mainly very curious about the process. In the morning before the exam I was able to get my 3mm taper completelly inserted. I took it out to go to my apointment.
I got at the hospital which is 5 minutes from home. They directed me towards the right place and I confirmed my presence at the counter. The assitant gave me a gown to change but told me to only remove my top as it was only an abdominal exam. I went in the changing room, took out my t-shirt and tried to figure out head and tails about how to actually wear the gown. I am sure I got it wrong. Then I got back to the waiting room and everybody figure out a different creative way to wear it anyway. They should give some instructions when they give you a gown.
I waited about 15 minutes a technician came get me and assigned me an exam room. She said they were a bit late due to some emergencies and to lay down and she would turn off the light to relax during the wait. After about 10 minutes I turned the lights back on because I am very curious so I examined the ultrasound machine in details while waiting. It is really an amazing piece of machinery. About half hour later the sonography technician showed up.
She looked a bit in a rush but was still very polite and welcoming. She asked me if I ever had a sonogram and I said no. She proceeded to explain how the process would happen. I really like knowing what will happen before it happens, so I appreciated. She told me she would remove my gown and start with me laying on my back. She would put some lubricating jelly that will be a bit cold, then she would slide the sensor over my skin. At some points she would ask me to breathe in or breath out or hold my breath or stay very still, etc. When she does she would usually press harder on the probe which should not cause any pain, but she told me to let her know if I do feel any pain.
The process went exactly as she explained. It was totally painless, not even any minor disconfort. The worst was the cold gel and maybe some spots where I am a bit ticklish. She did my belly and then asked me to turn over slightly to the side but not completelly, she kind of guided my legs to place me in the right position. She did the same on the other side and finished with my back.
During the whole process, she was talking a lot of snapshots (the machine actually makes the sound of a camera). There is a monitor the patient can see just like in the movies when a pregnant woman get's an echography. For most of the process except for my back, I was able to see the pictures she was taking. It is amazing to live in this day and age where we can see inside our bodies painlessly like that. I was amazed at the amount of details, although I was not really sure what I was looking at. The only thing that scared me a bit was when she was looking at my kidneys and I saw a big black round circle, she took some annotations I could see on the screen. It had some abbreviations I did not understand as well as measurements. I asked her "Is this bad" and she said she can't tell me if it's good or bad being a technician, the doctor would be the person telling me the results.
I was a bit under the impression that she did in fact find something wrong, I was thinking a cyst or stone, maybe that was the cause of my previous urinary tract infections, maybe I did pass somw small sandgrain sized stones or something like that...
I went back home after the exam and the 3mm taper was still fitting with some work and time. I was happy because 3mm is the smallest size to switch to the silicon rings that came with the ear stretching kit I got. I tried to just push it in as it is supposed to be for ears. It would not snap no matte what and the pressure was actually causing some pain. I did not insist too much. Even if it would go in that way, I guess it would be very hard to get out with less grip on it. So I tried instead to fold it in a heart shape but it is really hard to do with a 3mm piece, and with lubrican all over, I could not hold it in that shape for long for insertion. At one point I almost got it but it's edges are so shart that half inserted I had to stop and remove it due to pain in the foreskin inner surface (the phimotic ring in my case). I abandoned that idea of the 3mm silicon ring, to get the 3mm in confortably I would need to be at least at 4-5 mm dilatation and it would then be pointless to use a 3mm devide, it would strecth nothing then.
On the positive side of things, I went from almost nothing (let's call it 0.5mm) to 3mm in one week. In my previous attemps without a steroid cream, I had done this process over the course of maybe a month and I would be finghting inflamation every single day to barely keep maintaining it at 3mm. So I am very happy but a bit worried about the sonogram. I'll focus on the happy part, I won't see my doctor for 6 weeks (the amount of time she prescribed me the cream) still, so no point in panicking about this now. Also, I am not qualified to analyze these results, maybe it's something totally unimportant or maybe even something normal she needs to measure as part of the procedure.