My latest thing: strange sensation under right rib

[Aries]

I feel your pain. NYC is about ready for another surge because no one wants to wear masks. Maybe then people will start taking it seriously? But probably not. Ugh. And no one's learning from our mistakes it seems.

It's possible that enough people in NYC have been exposed to give enough immunity to avoid a major outbreak there.

 

[TX85]

An update, for anyone following, or reading this in the future...

What a strange and terrible journey this has taken me on. After we determined that the stent did indeed clear the path for my right ureter, we removed it on August 6 to see if having it there for a few months solved the problem. Well, two weeks later, I finally went and got the scans ordered by my gastroenterologist two months ago: an ultrasound and a stomach emptying study, and... not good news.

First off, the ultrasound indicated that my right kidney was enlarged again. Great. That was fast. So now my right kidney is backed up again and my only options are stents for the rest of my life, or a surgery that may or may not clean things up enough in my abdomen to stop the ureter from getting obstructed again. My other organs seemed fine, though, so that's always nice to hear. But still -- damn.

With regard to the stomach emptying study: I ate some radioactive stuff, and 4 hours later, about a fifth of it was still in my stomach and hadn't moved on. This is consistent with mild gastroparesis -- in other words, my guts move stuff very slowly, at least as far as my stomach is concerned. No wonder I only need two meals a day.

And through all of this, the pinching feeling under my right rib has come back, and I'm still no closer to knowing what is even causing it! I'm trying not to lose my mind here but I'm only 35 and all these things are just stacking up... identified problems and unidentified problems. I wish I knew how other people get through the day without fixating on their medical problems. I'm sitting here feeling like my body's slowly shutting down on me.

As for the next steps... I have no idea what's next. I'm trying to get a hold of my urologist regarding the obstructed ureter because I think it's time to talk surgery. As for my slow stomach, I don't know what I'm supposed to think or do about that, and I don't know what to do about the pinching feeling, either, since there's been no way to explain its cause yet. All the while, the coronavirus rages here in Texas...

 

[JesJune93]

I try to avoid asking about every new bodily concern that arises for me, but this one has me pretty scared for some reason. I think it's because I'm worried that if I did need urgent medical care, I'd have difficulty securing it because of the pandemic. It hasn't hit Texas all that hard yet as of March 28, but the operative word is yet because Texans are carrying on like nothing's coming. So that's going to turn out really well. Oh boy.

Anyway...

I feel like there's something under my ribcage, on the right (my right). It's just a sensation I'm receiving somewhat at random when I sit, stand, or lie down. Today, I noticed it immediately after eating lunch. Right now, I'm noticing it as I sit up straight and breathe in. Like there's.. just something there that normally isn't. It doesn't seem to be painful (though there have been occasional little twinges), and I can't feel anything if I prod it with my hand. Unfortunately, I gave in to temptation and googled my symptoms and started to find things about liver problems. I didn't dig too deeply because I knew I'd just freak myself out even worse.

I'm 100% open to it being gas or even some stool that isn't moving along as it should, but it's been about 3 days now and it keeps coming back in its random way. My digestion seems to be working, though I am slowly losing weight and have been for many months (I take proton pump inhibitors for my GERD and am aware that these can cause weight loss). Not eating out anymore because of the pandemic probably isn't helping -- my caloric intake has certainly plummeted.

By now, I'm sure you know where this is going: I'm concerned there's a cancer-type situation somewhere along my digestive tract, like my liver perhaps, given the positioning. I am a cancer survivor, so this can initiate spiraling. I'm trying very hard to hold it at bay, but it's getting more difficult with each day that this persists.

Has anyone else grappled with a similar sensation and/or concern? Thanks for reading.

I had a terrible pain under my left rib that wrapped around to under my left shoulder blade. It was a pulled muscle. It must've been deep in there because it hurt for a long time, and it hurt if I breathed too deep, it hurt if I laid a certain way! It really sucked, I asked my doctor and she told me generally anything that hurts when you breath in and not when you breathe out is a pulled muscle. Hope it has gone away by now lol

 

[TX85]

I had a terrible pain under my left rib that wrapped around to under my left shoulder blade. It was a pulled muscle. It must've been deep in there because it hurt for a long time, and it hurt if I breathed too deep, it hurt if I laid a certain way! It really sucked, I asked my doctor and she told me generally anything that hurts when you breath in and not when you breathe out is a pulled muscle. Hope it has gone away by now lol

It's still there -- this has been going on for quite a few months with no answers. My GP felt around and couldn't find any lumps and advised me to continue doing my crunches and stretches, and all the scans I've had done haven't shown anything. My personal belief is that this is either a [pulled] muscle, or an ulcer. It does not seem to be related to breathing, but in positioning (especially if I hunch over). Sometimes it'll just hurt regardless of what I'm doing, so I don't know. I'll continue seeking answers... my sanity depends on it.

 

[Aries]

I still have left groin pain. It was gone for a while but keeps coming back. I'm 99% certain it's a groin muscle. The doc I went to didn't check my prostate. He checked for a hernia but I don't have one. I'm just learning to live with it like I do with my foot neuromas and my left hip-butt piriformis syndrome

How bad it having stents to keep the kidney going? I just googled and read that there are special stents, which may be left in for longer than a few months.

 

[TX85]

I still have left groin pain. It was gone for a while but keeps coming back. I'm 99% certain it's a groin muscle. The doc I went to didn't check my prostate. He checked for a hernia but I don't have one. I'm just learning to live with it like I do with my foot neuromas and my left hip-butt piriformis syndrome

Yeah, if it's not an ulcer, then it is muscular and will simply be a learn-to-live-with-it kind of thing. Or, potentially, I could fix it with exercise and stretches. Since I still don't know what it is, it's difficult to plan either way.

How bad it having stents to keep the kidney going? I just googled and read that there are special stents, which may be left in for longer than a few months.

Having stents put in is kind of awful, to be honest. You have to be put under general anesthesia, and they jam a foot-long tube up your penis to connect your kidney to your bladder via the [obstructed] ureter. It stings like the dickens for a few weeks, and you pee a lot of blood and debris. You can usually feel the stent in your guts to some extent, and it's pretty uncomfortable. Having it removed isn't particularly lovely, either, even though you're awake and it's very quick. I'm only 35 -- the thought of having this done yearly for the rest of my life is extremely unappealing (and it would be very expensive, at least as long as I'm stuck in the USA). I'll do it if I must, but I'd really rather get the clean-up surgery and hope it works!

My urologist got back with me and said she wasn't worried about minor swelling and that there's no guarantee the ureter has been obstructed again -- we won't know for certain until I have another renal scan in about a month. I've had back pain on my right side amidst all this, so I do suspect that it's obstructed again, but I'll try to remain hopeful because otherwise, we're back to the stent vs. surgery discussion.

I kind of wish I were "only" having hypochondria, rather than issues that have physical causes. Ugh!

 

[Lunabelle30]

Sorry your going through all this!

I have been having the same symptoms but under my LEFT ribs. It started in December last year when i was going through a particularly bad period of anxiety and panic attacks and i've had it on and off ever since.

I can't even explain it, it's not really painful, some mild shooting pain here and there but mostly just a feeling that something is sat under my ribs that shouldn't be there. It's usually when i sit or lay down. Sometimes it's alittle bit like a stitch or a cramp, other times it feels like that part of me is numb. My doctor didn't really seem concerned, but i had blood work last week and they want to retest it next week to check a few things. Work isn't being great about me taking time off and i'm just a mess right now.

Do you think it could be an enlargered kidney like you?

 

[TX85]

Do you think it could be an enlargered kidney like you?

I'm not sure what organs are in the "upper left quadrant" as that would be called, but I would guess it's either one of those, something about an abdominal muscle, or a pinched nerve... so pretty much the same as me, just on the other side. I don't think what I've been feeling is related to my kidney -- that seems to have just been a coincidence, because you're not going to feel kidney problems in the places you and I are feeling things. Kidney problems will be felt in the lower back. I wish I could give you something better to go on, since not knowing is the worst part, but unfortunately that's where I still am after months of this. But I'm doing my best to track it down!

 

[Lunabelle30]

I'm not sure what organs are in the "upper left quadrant" as that would be called, but I would guess it's either one of those, something about an abdominal muscle, or a pinched nerve... so pretty much the same as me, just on the other side. I don't think what I've been feeling is related to my kidney -- that seems to have just been a coincidence, because you're not going to feel kidney problems in the places you and I are feeling things. Kidney problems will be felt in the lower back. I wish I could give you something better to go on, since not knowing is the worst part, but unfortunately that's where I still am after months of this. But I'm doing my best to track it down!

Sorry I missed some of your posts where you explained you don't believe its to do with your kidney issue.

I think it's stomach/pancreas in that area which is concerning to me. Does yours come and go depending on if your thinking about it?

 

[TX85]

Sorry I missed some of your posts where you explained you don't believe its to do with your kidney issue.

I think it's stomach/pancreas in that area which is concerning to me. Does yours come and go depending on if your thinking about it?

No worries, I've made a lot of posts! It's a lot to read! I hope at the end of it all, I can just post some quick summary of it all to save future readers some time.

And yes, that's the kind of stuff that's up there. I had similar concerns, and at one point thought it was my gall bladder. But scan after scan has shown nothing of interest there. And no, I can't control my sensations with thought, it's completely independent of that (which to me is scarier).

I had a CT scan today with oral contrast only, and hope to hear about the results either tomorrow or early next week. It's probably fine, but I still get nervous every time I have a scan done because... well, at any moment, I could get some seriously bad news...... or, just as easily, some good news! It's hard to stay optimistic, though!

I will add this, though. I stopped taking my daily pantoprazole 40 mg for a little less than week, as an experiment, and curiously, the pinching went away! How mysterious... but then, today, I was relaxing a little and spent some time hunched over my laptop in bed, and it came right back. Ugh. Talk about mixed signals! Is the medicine causing it, or is there something wrong with my organs, or is it really just some kind of cramp? Still no answers!

 

[TX85]

OK, well. Damn.

Curious results from that CT scan. Not great.

1. Kidney's enlarged. I'm almost positive the ureter is being constricted again and there's going to be a reckoning about it sometime soon. I may end up with another stent for a while, which isn't a thrilling prospect but it may be the only thing I can do in the short term. I'm having a test to confirm kidney function in a few weeks.

2. My bowels are quite full. My gastroenterologist says that the mysterious upper-right quadrant pinch I've been feeling for months is most likely my large intestine having a spasm because everything is so backed up in there. I don't know why I'm so backed up, but that seems to be a theme with every scan I've had lately. So, hopefully, that has solved the mystery. I'm having an endoscopy and colonoscopy later this month, and am going to be working to cleanse my bowels and get things moving more effectively.

3. The radiologist reviewing the aforementioned CT scan thinks they found a fracture in my hip. I've never broken any bones down there and I'm only 35... I'm also not experiencing any pain or dysfunction, so I have absolutely no idea what that's about. Apparently they also saw a lot of little "spots" on the bone that weren't there on my last scan. Again, no idea. We're going to investigate further with a bone scan that we haven't scheduled yet. Hopefully it's nothing -- I don't need additional problems right now.

As you might imagine, this is all weighing quite heavily on me. All the worrying takes so much energy that I have little left for going about my day, and it's so distracting that I wouldn't enjoy anything all that much anyway. I think problems 1 and 2 are related to the radiation treatment I received for my cancer as a child, meaning now I get to deal with retroperitoneal fibrosis. I'm not doing any independent research on that right now because it would probably send me into a spiral. I think the only path forward with that will be a surgery, and even that is unclear.

I mentioned this in my last post but... I realize this is supposed to be a forum for health anxiety, which often is just our minds playing tricks on us when our bodies really are fine. What I've got here, though, is actual physiological problems. I guess I'd just say that if you feel you need to go checked out, go get checked out. For me, I've advanced to the stage where I have confirmation that stuff isn't as it should be in my body, and my anxiety is knowing that and trying not to let it drive me crazy. Am I a ticking time bomb whose time is up? Or can this all be fixed well enough that I can live a relatively normal life? I just don't know yet. I want to be optimistic and believe in modern medicine, though.

 

[Aries]

My bowels are quite full. My gastroenterologist says that the mysterious upper-right quadrant pinch I've been feeling for months is most likely my large intestine having a spasm because everything is so backed up in there. I don't know why I'm so backed up, but that seems to be a theme with every scan I've had lately. So, hopefully, that has solved the mystery. I'm having an endoscopy and colonoscopy later this month, and am going to be working to cleanse my bowels and get things moving more effectively.

I go on fasts a couple of times a year to clear things out and get my diet on track. I tend to eat more and more junk and fast food. I find going liquid only for a while clears up my craving for sugar. Then for a while I eat more fiber. I find quinoa is pretty good. Have you tried a good fast?

 

[Joshua1]

I feel like there's something under my ribcage, on the right (my right). It's just a sensation I'm receiving somewhat at random when I sit, stand, or lie down. Today, I noticed it immediately after eating lunch. Right now, I'm noticing it as I sit up straight and breathe in. Like there's.. just something there that normally isn't. It doesn't seem to be painful (though there have been occasional little twinges), and I can't feel anything if I prod it with my hand. Unfortunately, I gave in to temptation and googled my symptoms and started to find things about liver problems. I didn't dig too deeply because I knew I'd just freak myself out even worse.

I'm 100% open to it being gas or even some stool that isn't moving along as it should, but it's been about 3 days now and it keeps coming back in its random way. My digestion seems to be working, though I am slowly losing weight and have been for many months (I take proton pump inhibitors for my GERD and am aware that these can cause weight loss). Not eating out anymore because of the pandemic probably isn't helping -- my caloric intake has certainly plummeted.

I do not think gas is trapped in the rib cage. I think it is a muscle issue. Or maybe bone. No it couldnt be bone because there is no pain. It could be that you are feeling food you have eaten. The point being is its hard to tell. There is so much it could be, see the doctor about it. I think it is a muscle issue. It also depends on build more thinner models tend to be able to see and feel more underneath bones. I cannot feel under my ribcage at all and i am around 15 stone. Not much of a fat belly, i kid you not.

 

[TX85]

Hi everyone. Well, this thread got way out of hand, didn't it? It all started with a weird feeling under my right rib and just blew out into all sorts of stuff!

I had a meltdown a few days ago with all these tests and waiting for results and everything else... it's just so much to handle. But knowing that something's not right made waiting impossible, so I had to push forward and try to get everything done at once to ease my mind. Maybe that was a mistake, I don't know.

But for anyone reading who is feeling the weird sensation or pinching under the right rib: in my case, it was constipation.

Yes, good old poop was the culprit for that one. I had a colonoscopy today and even though I did the prep for it pretty darn well, there was still stuff in there. Yikes. I'm going to be having a lot more fiber and soft stuff going forward, and doing a lot more walking. Just a part of growing older (and of having a history of cancer, I guess).

Unfortunately, there were polyps found as well (unrelated, I think) which is unusual because I'm only 35, but I'm going to just hope they were merely "pre-cancerous" (i.e. not cancer)... we'll know when we get the biopsy results back next week. Happy thoughts, happy thoughts... Anyway, because of those polyps, I have to go back for another colonoscopy in a year to make sure everything's good and boring in there. Hopefully I'm not writing this off too quickly only to get slammed with "umm so we found cancer" when those results come back, but I'm really trying to stay positive about this.

I have a lot of other medical issues that have been discovered as a result of this journey, so maybe that's the silver lining in a weird way... not knowing about them would have undoubtedly made them more difficult to handle in the future. At least now I can start to make some lifestyle changes and medical decisions.

 

[mollyfin]

Glad to hear you've found the culprit for some of these issues. Any idea yet what caused the hip fracture?

 

[TX85]

Glad to hear you've found the culprit for some of these issues. Any idea yet what caused the hip fracture?

I don't know what I might have done, since I never even knew it had happened... but I have been diagnosed with osteopenia, so that's probably what allowed it to happen. I had blood drawn today so we can try to track down why I have that. This has been a fun year!

 

[mollyfin]

I hope you get a break from all this crap soon.

 

[TX85]

I hope you get a break from all this crap soon.

Ugh tell me about it! I will have to have another stent put in because of the retroperitoneal fibrosis constricting my ureter and causing my kidney to back up and get all big, and maybe a big surgery to clear that up so I don't have to live a life of stent after stent after stent... and I've had to make some lifestyle changes including a new diet because of the gastro problems... so I'm not out of the woods or anything, but I think there's a light at the end of the tunnel. I do need a break -- this has been a LOT!