Pissing Blood

Yep, I'm going there...don't read on if you don't want details. It was high school sectionals and my teammate Eddy was vying for an individual ticket to the state championships. I remember finishing and seeing Eddy, who was still foaming at the mouth, being escorted by two teammates because he couldn't stand on his own. As we were moving Eddy, he told us he thought he pissed his shorts, and we all looked down, and to our horror, we saw his blood stained shorts. We were all so caught up on Eddy's HK (hard-kore with a "k" because it's much harder than with a "c") factor that we didn't even bother to think this actually might be a medically serious issue. Well, Eddy turned out to be okay, and from that day, Eddy set the standard for being HK.

I've vomited during and after races, passed out, suffered from hypothermia (funny story here), had multiple IV's, and even had my entire body under ice to bring my core body temp down, but I had never peed blood...until yesterday. I did a 19-miler, to break a hundo for that damn Strava 100-Mile Run Challenge, and since it was cool day, I decided not to carry any water (foreshadowing). At about the 11-mile mark, my back started to ache but I was averaging a good pace and I really wanted to PR this run (once again, damn you Strava). The back pain got progressively worst and then I started to experience some lower abdominal pain, but both were manageable. I thought the aches and pains might be due to one primary focus I had on this run: to run with better mechanics, specifically tightening my core to increase knee lift and stability. I got back to my car and headed off to the pool for a shakedown swim. I went to take a piss and OMG, saw nothing but red, actually, it was more like a red wine color. It just kept coming and I thought the red color would soon fade but the entire duration of the piss was the same red wine color. Initially, I panicked, but this was quickly replaced by pride. After almost 25 years, I finally met the Eddy standard for being HK.

But more seriously, piss in the blood is fairly common with runners, especially after a long run. It's called hematuria and it is usually no cause for alarm, just an empty bladder being irritated by all that jarring. I'm choosing to think this is what happened with me because my second urination was all clear (pun intended). However, since then, I've had frequent urges to pee and am thinking I might have given myself some type of infection, which I guess can happen from a bleeding bladder. I'm gonna drink lots of water and cranberry juice, and if it doesn't go away in 2-3 days, time to visit the good ole doctor. Hopefully, my meeting the HK standard won't come at too heavy of a price, crossing my fingers. No pictures...were you expecting some?