The Mysterious Case of The Missing Organ

A few years ago I was experiencing pain on the right hand side of my body. I pretended it wasn't there - like you do - but eventually decided it might be sensible to see the doctor about it. Off I went, and had a chat with her (this was my lovely old doctor, who died not that long after this bizarre episode. I have been struggling to find a doctor with whom I felt I could 'connect' ever since, but - touch wood - think I may finally have found one). After examining me, she said she thought it could be gallstones causing the pain, so said I should go for an ultrasound scan.

Me being me, I googled the matter, and found out there are lots of 'alternative' type things you can do about gallstones, so set about doing those whilst waiting for the appointment for the scan. I drank copious quantities of apple juice and tried to swallow olive oil too - these two things are said to make any gallstones much softer and therefore easier to flush out of your system without the need for invasive surgery. By the time my appointment for the scan arrived, I was experiencing much less pain, but went along anyway.

I seem to remember that the car park was completely full and HWNLR had to park on a grass verge as we'd been driving round the car park looking for a space for so long that the appointment time was rapidly approaching. Anyway, we went in and sat in the waiting room. We hadn't been there for very long before I was called in. I hopped up on the couch and freezing cold slimy stuff was applied to my abdomen before the radiographer set to work over that troublesome right side.

She was concentrating hard on her little screen, searching for possible gallstones, and pressing that implement of hers quite hard into my skin. She went 'down' a bit and commented that my right kidney appeared to be somewhat enlarged. She frowned. I don't like it when these people frown - you know it's not good, don't you? She said she wanted to look at the left kidney too and began squirting more cold, slimy stuff over the other side of my abdomen. This was not what I'd come for and I began to feel a bit anxious.

She poked her probey thing (I bet you're so impressed with my knowledge of technical terms :-D ) into my left side and stared hard at her little screen. She poked harder and went upwards. She poked harder still and went downwards. She frowned a bit more. I asked her if it was ok, and she said no, it wasn't ok. It wasn't ok, because it wasn't there: There was no left kidney.

As you might imagine this came as a bit of a shock. One goes merrily through life imagining that one has the requisite arrangement of internal organs, and to find in middle age that that is not the case, is a tad surprising. Of course in the days when I was born, there weren't ultrasonic scans for pregnant women. They occasionally did X-rays to find out what was happening, but for obvious reasons that wasn't desirable. When I told mum about it she felt terribly guilty that she hadn't 'grown me' properly - the general medical opinion being that I must have been born with only one kidney.

By this stage in my life I had had two children (and had antenatal scans with both) and three laparoscopies - the fact that nobody medical had noticed that the left kidney was absent was astonishing. The doctors themselves seemed rather surprised. In the event, it's perhaps just as well I didn't know about it beforehand, as I'm told there's no way they'd have let me have my son in the local cottage hospital (which I did). I'd have had to go into Oxford and had the pregnancies overseen by specialists every step of the way. I should perhaps not think too hard about the amount of falling-down liquids which I consumed in my late teens, and what that might have done to my poor overworked kidney. Although one friend did proffer the theory that I might have had two kidneys up until then, but that one might have gone AWOL in protest at my student days drinking habits.

Once they had discovered I was less than fully furnished in the kidney department, I was sent to the large Renal Unit in Oxford and underwent numerous blood tests, urine tests, and general health checks. They said the sole kidney was fine but that from here on I would have to have annual checks to make sure it remained healthy ... and I have. Until recently there was no cause for concern; however at the end of October I was not a happy bunny. I began to feel unwell after my seasonal flu jab - generally not good, but with this odd nagging pain on the right side of my back. It got a bit worse but it was the weekend so I made an online appointment for the Monday. However by the middle of the Saturday afternoon it was horribly painful and I didn't know what to do with myself. I called the out of hours medical service who wanted to see me immediately.

My brother gave me a lift over there (it's 9 miles away which isn't terribly handy) and at least he was happy - they had free wifi in the waiting room, so whilst I whimpered, he watched tv on his iPhone. To cut a long story short, the kidney was inflamed and very painful. There was no infection though, so that was good. They think I had a bout of 'renal colic' possibly caused by a kidney stone. Whatever the cause, it bloody well hurt and I didn't like it. It made me realise that I have to be a bit careful about this precious kidney of mine.

Mind you, I have the perfect get-out 'excuse' if anyone ever asks me to donate a kidney. ;-)

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