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Last week on June 20th I went in for my gallbladder removal (laparoscopic cholycystectomy if you like medical terminology). Due to the relative lack of personal stories of surgical experiences online, I'm throwing this up there for others facing this in the future. Here goes my long and sordid tale. Well maybe not so sordid...

My first gallbladder attack was around 6 years ago, sometime in the fall of 2000. I remember waking up slowly in the middle of the night, dreaming that my stomach hurt, only to wake up and find that it did actually hurt. For a while I tried to get back to sleep, but the pain steadily intensified to the point where I could either pace my apartment or curl into a fetal ball and grunt repeatedly. WOW! Amazingly, it never occurred to me to go to the ER, I just figured it was bad gas or something. After maybe 1.5 hours from waking, it finally started to seem like a good idea to vomit. I didn't really feel nauseous, but it just seemed like a good thing to try. After vomiting, I instantly felt better with the pain completely gone after another 15-20 minutes. Odd...

In the following months I had two more such attacks. Sometimes it was clearly right upper quadrant pain, sometimes it hurt more across the upper middle of my belly, and on one occassion it started out feeling like a back ache before moving around to the front. While these attacks were exceptionally painful, they were also infrequent (1x per month) so I put them on my list of things to chat with the doctor about at my next visit. Of course, for some unknown reason, the attacks stopped and didn't repeat for 6 years.

Now, I've noticed over the past year or two that I have a tendency to have mild nausea, especially in the morning. But it was very mild and I paid no attention to it. Then in january of this year, I had another attack. Bad pain, middle of the night, standard fair. Only this time I thought I would try taking some Gas-Ex. Amazingly, 10 minutes after taking some, I felt better and went back to sleep. I told my wife proudly the next morning that I solved my abdominal problems and I was relieved it was just gas.

Of course, 3 weeks later I had another attack, the only one where I bothered to keep track of my diet before hand. Yes, I had a nice greasy meal. This time, I excitedly tried my Gas-Ex trick, but by the time I did the pain was really bad and it did nothing. After putting it off for a while, I finally threw up, which relieved the pain as always, and went off to bed.

After these episodes, I noticed I sometimes had indegestion, feeling uncomfortably full even after eating a modest meal. My wife, having had her gall bladder out a year ago, also said that the attacks sounded a lot like gallstones to her... So, at my next doctor's visit I brought it up and got sent for an ultrasound. I was pretty sure by this point what the results would be, especially since it was tender when the doctor poked on my upper right side. The results of the ultrasound came back as positive for gallstones, though for some reason they left out a surprising amount of detail such as the size and quantity. They saw no evidence of inflammation, so I was scheduled a leisurely appointment with a general surgeon two months in advance.

At this point I was fairly certain I would put off having it out. After all, I'd only had 5 attacks in my life and they weren't frequent. I could live with that... Of course, my gallbladder had other plans...

While celebrating my wife's birthday in the end of May, I spend the memorial weekend pigging out. Cake, Ice Cream, a huge BBQ dinner, more cake, etc. I spent that sunday night feeling so full that I was tempted to vomit just to relieve the pressure. I propped myself up so I wouldn't choke on my reflux and took some tums, but only managed to sleep a few hours. The next morning I had nausea worse than I'd ever had in my life. Anything I ate made me nauseated, though luckily I wasn't vomiting. But overall, I felt horrible and it lasted for 3 days, relieved finally by a 2 day liquid diet. I gradually went back to solid food and vowed to stick to the low fat diet and have the gallbladder removed as soon as possible.

Of course the following week we went on vacation, which was somewhat of a dissapointment as eating low fat on vacation is kind of like being a recovering alcoholic working in a brewerey... I did fine, eating my bland food, until my sister's birthday. I baked her a cake, and I figured I could eat a little slice. With ice cream. After having a few ribs and some steak. Whoops. I'd like to thank my wife for not saying "I told you so" when I woke her up at 5 AM ready to go to the hospital for some painkillers. This time I took some motring and a half hour later, the pain faded away and we enjoyed the rest of the vacation without incident.

On June 15th I finally had my appointment with the surgeon. Oddly enough, I had to wait about 2 hours... I've usually found surgeons to be much more punctual than GP's but he may have had an emergency earlier, who knows. He was a nice guy, older and had clearly been at it for a while, which was reassuring. His resident asked me a ton of questions whereas he just listened to my description of the attacks before announcing I was a classic gallstone sufferer. We went to scheduling and set up my surgery for the following tuesday. This was quicker than I expected and meant spending my weekend in a state of high anxiety awaiting my surgery day...

We scheduled the appointment for 10:30 giving us plenty of time to get the kids to daycare and make it to the hospital. Of course, they called the day before and said they had a cancellation and had to bump me up to 7:30 which meant arriving at the hospital by 5:30! Thanks to the kids I talked them into bumping someone else up to that time and scheduling me at 9:30 so that we'd have a chance to get the kids at daycare before coming in.

So surgery day was a normal start, and after leaving the kids with my dad for a bit (as we had to leave earlier than normal) we headed off to the hospital. My wife tried to engage me in conversation, but at best I managed a few stiff nods in reply. We arrived at the Ohio State University Hospital on time and checked in. Up we went, having done the same procedure for my sinus surgery, nothing was really surprising.

Once in our room, I put on my gowns and grippy hospital socks (I love those things) and to my suprise was almost immediately whisked down to pre-op. For my sinus surgery, we waited up in the room for a while and they wheeled me immediately down to the OR. I hadn't really liked that since it meant they couldn't give me any drugs until I got to the OR (since the orderlies who wheel you around aren't train to deal with medical emergencies). I learned that this was because I had been the first operation of the day, for later operations they stick you in pre-op while you wait. This meant sooner versed for me, so I was in favor of it.

The pre-op room was dimly lit and only had a few people in it. The guy next to me had apparently broken both legs in a car accident and had been life flighted in, and he was heavily dosed up on painkillers which made for interesting conversations. Anyway, they took my history, made sure I knew why I was there, talked with the anesthesiologist, etc. I'm always nervous about the anesthesiologist because he's the guy who keeps you alive, so I tend to worry about him more than the actual surgeon... Anyway, he was a bit low key and gruff, but had that experienced vibe so I felt ok with it. Plus he gave me drugs. Versed, a potent sedative, is easily one of my favorite drugs. While it makes many people wonky, it gives me a somewhat carefree relaxed drunken high feeling. I joke with my anesthesiologist that if it were readily available as a street drug I might be tempted, and he said that actually it's not too hard to get and is frequently abused...

Anyway, once the versed is in, all the anxiety goes away. It hits you in about 20-30 seconds and comes on with a strong head rush, feeling somewhat like your brain and eyes are shaking. That only lasts a few seconds though, and you are mostly lucid and totally relaxed. The fact that you are about to put your life in someone else's hands only to wake up in a fair amount of pain becomes a distand concern making you wonder what you were so nervous about. Seriously, this is good stuff, and if you are anxious about your surgery, enquire about getting your sedative sooner rather than later.

I waited a bit in recovery, it's hard for me to know how long since the versed does tend to make you a bit wonky, cause some mild amnesia and in general make the passage of time fly... But eventually they came around and said it was time to go. I got another small versed dose and was then wheeled out. Although I know I was awake and mostly alert, I don't remember the ride to the OR at all, or entering the room. I do vaguely remember scooting over onto the table and talking to the team of people that suddenly appeared looking very busy, none of whom I knew... My hips were strapped to the table, then they had me put my arms out to the side and they were strapped down to some arm extensions. At this point I made some vague joke about being crucified which the anesthesiologist chuckled at, but he probably gets that a lot. After that he told some other guy to give me 2 mg of something or other. I was just about to ask what I was getting, if he was putting me under or what, when my brain seemed to quiver in a most peculiar way and I was out. I'm not sure how common it is to remember going under, I don't have any memory of it from my last 2 surgeries, but this time I definately remember it. It wasn't terrible, the feeling only lasted a second and I was gone, but it was odd to know I was going under...

Next thing I knew I was in the recovery room, unable to open my eyes but vaguely aware I was alive. I drifted in and out for a bit, finally able to open my eyes and see around, only to quickly close them as the room was spinning in a rather uncomfortable way. A nurse asked how my pain was and I recall saying it was maybe a 6 out of 10, and she said they'd give me a little more dilaudid, and then the pain magically went away and I went back to sleep. As I started coming around a bit more, I felt kind of like I needed to cough up some junk which they said was a normal reaction to having a tube shoved into my lungs. They told me everything went well, my stats were all fine and as soon as I felt a little less out of it I could go back up to my room.

I think they released me sometime around noon and I went back upstairs to a recovery room and met up with my wife. The pain wasn't bad at all at this point, although standing up to move to a reclining chair was pretty painful. Everything was still a bit out of focus and spinny at this point but it was getting better. I felt pretty itchy which they said was from the painkillers and was a pretty common reaction. I had some sprite and graham crackers, but couldn't eat much since my mouth and throat were dry. Overall I was pretty comfortable and dozed for a bit and then we were ready to head home, at around 3 pm. At this point I barely hurt at all and I refused any more pain meds before leaving, since I was getting a little tired of feeling groggy and drugged.

The car ride home was easy enough, I felt a little quesy but luckily this was the only nausea I had through the whole ordeal. Back at home I made it upstairs and into bed to rest for a while. The pain still wasn't too bad, but by the time I made it back downstairs at 6:30 to watch a move, it was coming on. I think I waited too long to take a percocet.

That night I came to the realization that I would have to sleep on my back. I hate sleeping on my back, and I knew that even with the narcotics, it would be a long night. It was. At this point I found I needed a percocet every 4 hours. Actually I probably needed 1 every 2-3 hours, but I didn't want to take that many and feel so drugged. The percocet seemed to take about an hour to kick in and then relieved the pain really well for 2 hours or so. That hour it takes to kick in, and the hour where it starts wearing off could get pretty painful. Overall it hurt more than I expected, but it wasn't unbearable. The percocet worked well and as long as I sat or laid down and didn't move, it wasn't so bad.

Walking, however, hurt. A lot. Oddly enough the first night and the next morning, it mosty hurt in my shoulder. It was really uncomfortable, but only bad when moving around. The nurses said this was referred pain from the excess gas blown into my abdomen, and that it would go away in a few days as the gas was absorbed.

The day after surgery wasn't too bad. I had no appetite but did eat a few things. No nausea, mostly just really tired and hurting. The percocet still made me itchy, but it worked really well for the pain so I kept taking it. It also dried me out and made it hard to pee, but it was worth it. I spent most of the day sleeping and watching TV, trying hard to not move much since it really hurt my shoulder.

By the end of the day, my abdoment started hurting around the gallbladder area. As expected, it pretty much felt like someone had sliced out one of my internal organs... But still, I could barely feel any pain if I lay still. Walking hurt, as did deep breaths, yawning, burping, coughing, etc. I still didn't sleep well, but I did manage a stretch of 2 hours of sleep.

The next day, second day after surgery, the pain was about the same. Standing up really hurt, burping and hiccups were quite painful too. But as the day wore on I started feeling better and the pain began to fade a little. My appetite came back and I ate well. I found that overall I was pretty comfortable as long as I didn't move around much. Still didn't sleep well that night but I was napping a lot during the day to make up for it.

The next day the pain level was quite a bit better and I was able to switch to Motrin during the day, instead of percocet. It was mainly to help with the shoulder pain, which had gone from a severe ache to a nuisance pain. I ate well and slept most of the day and was generally feeling a bit back to normal. I slept decently well that night, and was able to lay on my left side briefly although it was really uncomfortable. I had been having some rather uncomfortable back pain the last few nights, I'm not sure if it was referred pain or just pain from laying on my back so much, but it was nice to roll to the side a bit even if it did hurt.

The next day, 4 days after surgery, I was doing pretty well. I was still tired, and it hurt to bend over, but I actually made it outside to a community cookout. The shoulder pain was almost gone and as long as I didn't bend, the abdominal pain wasn't bad. That night I slept decent, I was able to lay on my left side for longer stretches, but our 4 month old baby made sure I didn't get too much sleep...

5 days after surgery I was doing well. We made a trip to have lunch with my mom, which exhausted me, but I survived. I even managed to do all the laundry and take care of the baby for 3 hours while my wife napped. I haven't been able to do much baby care as lifting things tended to hurt, and I couldn't really hold her against me becuase the pressure on my belly hurt. But I'm getting back to the point where I can carry her around somewhat if I'm careful of how I hold her.

Today, 6 days after surgery, I'm doing pretty well. Still tired, but I have been for 4 months since the baby was born. The pain is down to the level where I'm not even taking motrin anymore and I spent almost the entire night sleeping on my left side. I can pretty much move around normally with no pain and my shoulder no longer hurts. The only real milestone I have left is to sleep on my right side, we'll see how long that takes...

Overall, it wasn't too bad of an experience. It was a little more painful that I'd expected, but not unbearably so and the percocet worked well when it got bad. I'm very relieved that I can eat whatever I want now without fear of pain and nausea. Let's just hope I can keep off the 15 lbs I lost during this ordeal...