Howdy all, thought I'd go ahead and share my catheter experience today from an actual ER visit. I woke up this morning and couldn't pee, which was unusual but I just brushed off as part of my past hesitancy issues and figured I'd go later after some water. Well, I went to church, tried to pee after and couldn't. Tried again when my father took me to lunch and nothing happened. At that point it was getting noticeably painful.
A bit after I got home from that when I still couldn't go, I decided to go see a doctor. Tried urgent care which sent me to the ER because they didn't have anything to help. Once I got checked in at the emergency room and they got my vitals, they took me back to a room and took some blood.
After the blood draw, a nurse came in and had me undress from the waist down, giving me a blanket to cover up while she got the ultrasound machine ready. After scanning my bladder and confirming that I wasn't making shit up, she went and got a Foley catheter to drain the urine. It was by no means the most unpleasant medical experience of my life, and I might have enjoyed it if I hadn't been in so much pain. Silver lining there is I didn't get hard as she was retracting my foreskin and cleaning my penis, although I doubt I would have been able to care that much if I had.
Once the catheter was in and they drained a little over 1.5L from my bladder, they did a CT scan which found nothing wrong. With no idea of what caused the retention in the first place, they sent me home with the catheter and instructions to get the next available urologist appt for follow up.
2022: “You're going to go bankrupt from a knee injury!”
2023: "Hold my beer."