A Tale of Two Frustrations

It’s been about 3 weeks since I first became familiar with epididymitis and after 3 weeks of antibiotics and medication, there’s still a persistent dull ache whenever I move or touch my testicular region. I still hold out on the small glimmer of hope that the pain and swelling will eventually go away like the doctor said. However, forums about epididymitis paint a completely different picture. Take a look at just a few of the quotes I pulled off the Internet from various people talking about one of the worst things to plague man.

“I’ve had it for almost 2 years. 2 years of agony, depression, pain and worrying.”

“This is the WORST pain in my whole life...I have balled my eyes out for days just wishing the pain would let up...I just can’t imagine going weeks, months or even years.”

“One day, I almost passed out while driving because the pain in my left testicle was so severe.”

“OMG!...I have had this for 3 days now and now I’m scared to death after hearing you all having it for months and years...Does anyone else feel the worst pain in your lives because of this??”

“Tell you what, I’d jump at the chance of removing my testicle because it's nothing but trouble. They could always freeze sperms if you wanted children, but I don’t fancy this on and off for the rest of my life.”

“Removing the testicle may be a waste of time. One urologist told me some men still have pain. Now I just live with the pain.”

Maybe instead of feeling depressed and frustrated, I should feel thankful that my pain hasn’t reached such a level as to make me want to cut off my testicle.

Speaking of frustration, I’ve been having the same feeling when dealing with our quest to get Caitlyn potty trained. Good news is she now knows not to pee when she’s in her underwear. At first, I thought she was trying to hold her pee in because she would go hours without having to use the bathroom. But it turns out that lots of kids can go long stretches without peeing. I read online about a two-year-old who could hold his bladder from 7:00 at night until 7:00 in the morning. That is mighty impressive.

Say, you wouldn’t be interested in hearing one of my many stories about urine, would you? That's right, I have just as many stories about pee as I do with fecal matter.

In high school, my friends and I would go to the library at nights to “study.” Most of the time would be wasted chatting and horsing around. One time, I joked with a friend that I was going to ask his sister out. He pretended to get angry and put me in choke-hold. Or maybe he wasn’t pretending because he never let go of the hold and I passed out.

When I woke up, I was in a pool of yellow liquid. For a moment, I thought that maybe someone’s drink had spilled on top of me, but then I slowly realized that I had peed in my pants. Not uncommon because the bladder relaxes when one passes out. Long story short, my friend apologized profusely and cleaned up all the pee on the floor. No way I couldn’t forgive him after that.

Anyway, enough about me. Back to Caitlyn. If she does need to go pee, she’ll tell us to switch her into a diaper. When she says this, we immediately take her to her the potty. In order to get her to sit on it for an extended period of time, we bribe her with the iPad. However, she’ll just play with it until she’s tired of it and then request to have a diaper put on. Come to think of it, that’s a pretty crafty way for her to get in some playing time without actually having to go potty. Even a spiffy new toilet hasn’t really convinced her to go.

So that’s where we’re stuck now. Any helpful suggestions? 

I'll sit, but I won't pee!

Where's my iPad?