Are you currently dealing with kidney stones? If so, you may have ongoing issues with pain. What is happening when your kidney stone pain comes and goes? Here are the answers you’re looking for.
The first thing you may be dealing with is cramping pain either in your sides, back, and the abdomen area. In some cases, you may feel the pain in the groin area. If you’re experiencing pain in waves throughout the day, it’s because your body is trying to get rid of the stone.
It can be very painful for the kidney stone to fit its way into and down the ureters so that it can be eliminated from your system. Some people say that this part is the most painful. If your stone is in one of your ureters (the tubes that carry urine from each kidney into the bladder), you’ll likely feel pain in your back. If the stone is in the left ureter, your pain will be on the left side of your back. If in the right ureter, the pain will be on the right side of your back.
The reason why passing the kidney stone through the ureters is painful is because it is very narrow. The pain associated with kidney stones usually is the result of muscle spasms triggered by a stone stuck in the ureter, coupled with pressure in the kidney from urine backup. You often are going to also experience other symptoms than just the pain such as pressure in your abdomen, feeling like you need to constantly urinate, nausea, and vomiting.If your stone moves down toward your groin, you’ll usually feel an urgency to urinate, and you’ll urinate often. You may also have a burning sensation. It may feel like you have a bladder infection or a urinary tract infection because the discomfort is remarkably similar. If your kidney stone reaches the bladder, generally the pain's over and you’ll pass the stone when you urinate. Some people think it’s painful when you pass the stone, but that’s not usually true. Once it reaches your bladder you often do not have any more pain and you may not even know you passed the stone unless you are straining your urine.
If you want to deal with kidney stone pain that comes and goes, there are many things that you can do.
First, you want to change your diet. Kidney stones can become worse if you don’t adjust your diet to the type of kidney stone you have. Calcium oxalate stones will require you to consume less foods with high oxalate content and in general, consume less oxalates. Uric acid stones will require you to cut down on the consumption of animal protein as it causes elevated uric acid levels, which can lead to the stones.
Second, you want to drink more water. Drinking more water is going to make it easier for your body to flush out the kidney stone. It can be especially helpful to drink water with citrate as citrate helps prevent the buildup of kidney stones. This can be done by adding a squeeze of lemon, lime, or oranges to your water.
Finally, you want to consider taking supplements. Some supplements have shown that they can help dissolve and flush out existing kidney stones and most importantly also help prevent them from forming.
Also your doctor may be able to provide you with an RX medication that helps keep stones form forming.
Hopefully, that has given you clarity about why kidney stone pain comes and goes. You will usually feel the symptoms and fluctuating pain while you’re in the process of passing the kidney stones. We do recommend that you visit your doctor and so that you can figure out what kind of kidney stones that you’re dealing with, the size, quantity and where located. If kidney stone(s) are under 6mm, the stones usually can be passed on their own without outpatient surgery.
This is the only way you’ll be able to address the roots of your kidney stones and make the necessary changes to make it easier to pass the kidney stones and prevent them in the future.
