When I Was Told There Was Nothing I Could Do.

I walked into a lawyer’s office hoping for answers.
I walked out believing there was nothing I could do about the surgery that changed my life.

After my surgery in June of 2019, my husband was angry.

And honestly, he had every right to be.

What happened to me didn’t feel fair. It didn’t feel acceptable. It felt like something that never should have happened.

Everyone around us thought the same thing.

Friends.
Family.
Even people who barely knew the details.

They all said I should sue.

But for reasons I still don’t fully understand, I struggled with that idea.

Part of me felt overwhelmed.
Part of me felt unsure.
Part of me just wanted to heal and move forward.

I wanted to forgive her.

I found myself trying to look at everything through a glass half full lens.

Yes, my bladder had been injured.
Yes, the surgery had gone terribly wrong.

But it was still intact.

It was still inside my body.

I kept telling myself that things could have been much worse.

I tried to help my husband see it that way too.

I told him I was lucky.

Lucky that the tear could be repaired.
Lucky that I didn’t lose my bladder altogether.

Lucky that I didn’t leave that hospital with a urostomy.

That reality was very real.

And compared to that, I felt like I had escaped something even more life altering.

Forgiveness felt easier than anger.

Hope felt lighter than bitterness.

It’s hard not to forgive someone when Jesus has forgiven me for my shortcomings, and there are many.

In July, I finally reached out to a local attorney in Anchorage.

I explained everything.
The surgery.
The bladder tear.
The complications.

After listening, he told me there was nothing I could do.

He said that because my doctor had called in urology to consult during surgery, she wasn’t considered negligent.

That was it.

No case.
No options.
No path forward.

At the time, I didn’t know much about medical malpractice law.

Honestly, I still don’t know everything.

But over time, as I’ve learned more, I’ve realized that what I was told isn’t always true.

Calling in a specialist doesn’t automatically erase negligence.

Consultants are often called when something goes wrong, when a complication happens, or when help is needed to fix an injury.

The real legal question isn’t, “Did the doctor call for help?”

It’s:

Should the injury have happened in the first place?
Did the medical team follow the standard of care?

In my case, there were major risk factors.

I had extensive adhesions and scar tissue from previous surgeries. My doctor even told my husband it looked like “a bomb went off” inside me.

The surgery became extremely difficult.

In situations like that, medical standards often recommend converting from a laparoscopic procedure to an open surgery to improve visibility and reduce risk.

But that didn’t happen.

They continued laparoscopically.

A small puncture in my bladder was identified.

But instead of repairing it immediately, surgery continued.

Hours passed.

Urine leaked into my pelvic cavity.

By the time urology repaired the injury, that tiny puncture had become a full tear.

In many malpractice cases, failure to convert to open surgery when conditions become unsafe can be considered negligence.

Delaying repair of a known injury can also be considered negligence.

Calling in a specialist afterward doesn’t undo those decisions.

So why was I told there was nothing I could do?

Medical malpractice cases are complex. They require expert witnesses and significant resources. Many attorneys who don’t specialize in this area may give quick answers without fully investigating.

Sometimes it isn’t that there was no negligence.

Sometimes it’s that the case is hard.

Or complicated.

Or up against strict legal timelines.

And that’s where Alaska’s laws come in.

In Alaska, there isn’t just a statute of limitations tied to when an injury is discovered.

There’s also a statute of repose.

That clock starts ticking the moment surgery ends.

No matter when symptoms appear.
No matter when complications surface.
No matter when a patient finally understands what happened.

Even if negligence is clear, the door can still close.

Looking back now, I don’t believe the biggest barrier was whether something went wrong.

I believe the biggest barrier was time.

The pain didn’t just linger after New York.

It took over.

I was peeing constantly. Not a few extra trips here and there. It felt like thirty to forty bathroom breaks every single day and night combined. My life became a cycle of standing up, rushing to the bathroom, sitting in pain, and going right back again.

But it was at night when it truly hit.

I later learned that interstitial cystitis often feels worse after dark because urine becomes more concentrated while you sleep, irritating an already inflamed bladder lining. Hormone levels shift, pain sensitivity increases, and there are fewer distractions to pull your focus away from what your body is feeling.

Your bladder fills.
The pressure builds.
And the inflamed nerves fire nonstop.

All of it collides in the quiet hours.

For me, nighttime became unbearable.

The burning intensified.
The pressure grew heavier.
The urgency never stopped.

I would pee, crawl back into bed, and within minutes feel that sharp, screaming sensation all over again.

Up.
Bathroom.
Pain.
Back to bed.

Then right back up.

Over and over.
All night long.

There was no relief.
No position that helped.
No break for my body.

Sleep was no longer sleep. It was short, broken moments in between pain.

Twenty minutes.
Maybe thirty if I was lucky.

Most nights, I wasn’t.

Exhaustion settled into me so deeply it felt like it lived in my bones.

Eventually, I became anxious about bedtime.

Not because I couldn’t sleep.

But because I knew what was waiting for me.

I knew the pain would come.
I knew the constant bathroom trips would start.
I knew the night would be long and miserable.

Laying down didn’t mean rest.

It meant hours of suffering.

And the worst part was knowing there was no end in sight.

I tried to get in to see my urologist.

But then COVID hit.

Appointments were canceled.
Offices were closed.
Everything was delayed.

So I did what so many people do when they’re hurting and can’t get answers.

I turned to good old Dr. Google.

Late nights, exhausted and desperate for relief, I started researching my symptoms.

Everything pointed to a urinary tract infection.

The burning.
The urgency.
The constant need to pee.

But there was never an infection.

No bacteria.
No explanation.

I also started noticing a pattern.

The pain would surge for a few days.

Then calm down.

Then come back again.

At the time, I didn’t know those were flares.

Later, I learned that so many things could trigger an IC flare.

Stress.
Bumpy car rides.
Travel.
Cycling.
Long periods of sitting.
Tight clothing.

And many of the foods and drinks I consumed every day:

Coffee.
Tea.
Soda.
Alcohol.
Spicy foods.
Tomatoes.
Citrus.
Chocolate.
Artificial sweeteners.

I was unknowingly fueling the pain.

Trying to live normally.

And slowly making it harder on my body.

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Being told “there’s nothing you can do” was devastating.

But what’s even more heartbreaking is realizing how many patients hear those same words, not because nothing went wrong, but because the system wasn’t built for complex, delayed, or hard-to-prove injuries.

I don’t believe the biggest barrier was whether negligence happened.

I believe the biggest barrier was time.

A system that measures harm by calendars instead of medical reality.

A system that doesn’t account for surgeries that escalate, injuries that worsen over hours, or conditions that take years to reveal themselves.

Sometimes being told you don’t have a case doesn’t mean nothing went wrong.

It just means the system wasn’t designed to see the whole picture.

And that’s why this needs to change.

Patients shouldn’t lose their right to accountability simply because injuries take time to unfold.

Legal timelines should reflect medical reality, not rigid deadlines.

Statutes of repose and narrow discovery rules disproportionately harm people with chronic conditions, delayed complications, and hidden injuries.

Reform doesn’t mean endless lawsuits.

It means fairness.

It means giving patients a reasonable chance to understand their harm before the door closes.

It means building a system that recognizes that healing and injury don’t always happen on a clock.

Until that happens, too many people will continue to fall through the cracks.

Not because nothing happened.

But because time ran out before truth had a chance to surface.