Well, I knew it was coming, but I wasn't planning on it to happen like this. After I got out of the hospital last time all the docs kept telling me that I shouldn't still be in pain and "just don't eat high fat and you'll be ok". They all told me I needed my gallbladder removed, but their offices and schedules were booked through the end of October so that is the time period we were looking at for everything to happen. In the mean time I have been having an average of one attack a week, and if anyone has ever had a gallbladder attack/stone you know that this is absolute misery. I was eating zero fat somedays and still had attacks on those days. I've never had kids, but others have equated it to being in continuous labor, with no contraction breaks, and no pain meds.

Last week another attack came on and just continued to get worse and worse into the wee hours of the morning. I finally decided to take the hydrocodone the GI doc prescribed when I last saw him, totally expecting it to knock me out and make me nauseous and dizzy as all pain killers do, and it did NOTHING! That's when I got scared. I got so weak from the sweating and constant spasms for hours that I couldn't even get up by myself. I called me husband into the bedroom (he was up and expecting the trip to the ER) and asked him to help me put on a loose t-shirt and shorts (I couldn't even do that by myself) and take me to the ER. At the ER they shot me full of the strongest thing they had and it made the pain manageable. (I think I have a fairly high pain tolerance..I used zero pain killers after my hyst years ago and felt like I could have left the hospital hours after the surgery) They re-did the ultrasound and CT and told me that my GB was totally full of tiny stones and now my pancreas AND my liver enzymes were up and they were worried. I was admitted in the wee hours of the morning and spent two days waiting for the enzyme levels to come down. Finally on the third day they were down enough and within 30 minutes of the blood test I was being wheeled into surgery.

The surgeon told me that it was so inflamed that the GB was stuck to everything and very enlarged, as was the cystic duct. Luckily they were still able to do it laprascopically. I woke up with four new holes on my stomach and one less GB. I was up and talking to everyone 5 minutes into recovery, but the pain is still pretty severe even now, several days later. I stayed another day and a half in the hospital. My back still aches somewhat and deep breathes are painful, but it is so much better than where I have been for the last month. In addition, I have now come to realize that the pain I thought was reflux, and even the pains I was having for a few days in July, were all GB related. The GB not working was causing me not to digest my food properly, which in combination with a new smaller stomach was causing me immense pain in my stomach/bowels.

The surgeon did also tell me that he looked at my stomach while in there and it looked suprizingly good , but that there really wasn't a whole lot of restriction to it. . Oh well, it has been a helpful tool..I did find out while in the hospital the first time that my cholesterol is now normal (down 83 points) and my blood pressure is normal to low. I'm still losing, and I'm not totally unhappy where I am, so while the plication hasn't turned out to be exactly what I was anticipating, I'm still overall happy.

My doc told me that stones take at least six months to form...so that means I had the stones pre-surgery. For all the lurkers that are thinking about wls, my advice is to get your gallbladder checked prior to your surgery and possibly save yourself some pain, time, and expense by taking care of it with just one surgery!

Hopefully now I can focus on healing and get back to my life...I really feel like I missed out on the whole month of September!

Glad you're finally feeling better!

Just over two weeks out from surgery and going for my checkup. I am happy to report that I am able to wear tight jeans again and eat most anything I want. I develop a lot of gas and burp a lot, but I can live with that. Life is much better without the GB and all the fun issues it was throwing at me!

I'm glad to hear you're doing better and sorry to hear you had complications with your gall bladder. Kudos to the healthier lifestyle and hope it gets even better from here on out!