TIFU by taking a pregnancy test and ending up at the hospital

Technically this was not today, but recently. As a quick backstory, I (24F) have been diagnosed with PCOS, and was told that I may still be able to have children but that it would be harder due to the irregular cycle I have. There are tests and medication the doctors have offered but in this economy and the health care prices, I get so angry that I have to jump through all of these expensive hoops, so I have not continued the fertility testing/treatment process.

To put it simply, I have been wanting children since the day I turned 18, and if all worked properly I would have. So I am pretty positive it will be a process for me to get pregnant, but until I can fully afford the testing, without having to put the rest of my life on pause, I just track my cycle and test periodically for ovulation and pregnancy.

Basically, my period could come 2x a month or skip 7 months with no warning and that is completely normal for me. Because of this, I never really think I’m pregnant but if I haven’t had my period in more than a month, I’ll randomly take pregnancy tests when I think about it. These tests are never planned, I just always have tests in my bathroom.

Anyway, to the day in question. My boyfriend (29M) and I were running errands on a Saturday morning. We had been out and about from 10-2pm and I didn’t once stop to use a restroom. On the way home, I started needing to pee, and I was cool with waiting to get home. Once we got home, we had to take out the groceries away and take the dogs outside. Taking the dogs out took about 15 minutes since we live in an apartment. By the time we made it back inside I could barely hold it. I walked into the restroom and randomly thought of how I had not had my period in like 3 months and I could take a test right then. For a split second I debated but thought I would forget to take one if I didn’t do it right then.

So I start searching for my box of tests. I look under the sink. It’s not there. I look in the cabinet behind the toilet. Nope. Finally I check in the closet, and I find it. I struggle to open the test and prep the test. – This test is the small test strip type that you dip in the pee? I hope that makes sense – I’m opening the package and everything while barely holding onto my pee. Finally, I waddle over to the toilet and go to sit down.

Instead of feeling the relief of releasing my badder I felt the worst pain I’ve ever felt shoot through my entire back and hips and because of the way I sat down, the pain didn’t seem to want to go away until I got up. So the entire time I was peeing the pain was shooting through me to the point where I was bawling tears before I finished peeing. When I finished, I went to stand back up and couldn’t fully due to the pain. I had to walk from the toilet to my bed bent over in horrible pain with my pants/underwear at my knees.

When I got to the bed, I thought I would be fine and I could just lay down. Nope, I couldn’t even get ON the bed because I couldn’t move my back without the pain getting worse. So I yelled to my boyfriend because all I could do was cry in pain with my chest laying on the bed while I was stuck bent over. He came running in to find me with my ass out, sobbing, saying unintelligible words. I finally tell him that my back hurts and I can’t move &’ he helps me climb onto the bed and lay down. However the entire time I am just screaming through pain because no matter which way I moved, if I put any pressure on my lower back it made the pain worse. AND since I was so worked up I was shaking and using more of my core, which just continued to make the pain worse.

I started going into a full blown panic/meltdown. I called my dad &’ he told me to go to urgent care if I needed to. I then called my best friend who had recently gone through similar back pain and had gone to have an MRI done. She gave me some tips on how to lay down to have the least pressure and hopefully calm the pain. Finally after getting off the phone, I was still crying in pain. My boyfriend offered to call the ambulance &’ I said no because we live in America, be fr. Then he said he’d take me, but when I tried to get up to walk to the car I couldn’t.

I ended up laying there crying in pain for 2 hours, simply because I couldn’t handle trying to walk because of how bad it hurt. Finally after 2 hours, it has calmed enough for me to walk to the car, and into the hospital. I get checked out, which was a HUGE waste of time and money because by the time we left, all they had told me is I did not have a uti, and I wasn’t….. pregnant. They couldn’t at all tell me why my back did that or if it would be a problem. They offered PT and sent me home. I later received bills totaling in about $2000 out of pocket(1850 deductible) for almost nothing.

After 2 days, the pain finally fully went away and luckily I have not had that happen again. However, it probably wouldn’t have happened if I just left the pregnancy test alone.

TL;DR: I held my pee too long and still tried to take a pregnancy test when using the restroom, which caused hours of unbearable pain leading to a hospital visit, $2000 in medical bills, and still no positive pregnancy.