I went to the emergency room a couple weeks ago with severe (and I do mean severe) abdominal pain. The doc at the ER suspected gallstones. I went to my regular doctor the next day for follow up. The earliest they could schedule and ultrasound was Feb 6. They sent me home and told me to stay away from fatty foods. So, I ate vegetable soup and fruit juice for the rest of the week. Last Saturday night (22nd) I was in pain again so I went back to the ER. They did blood tests and called in the ultrasound lab. Definitely got the gallstones so I was admitted to the hospital. Sunday the surgeon came by to visit me. He suspected one or more of the stones migrated out of the gall bladder and down the common bile duct. The blocked duct was causing me to have pancreatitis and my liver was backing up so I was also getting jaundiced. The doctor didn’t want to do surgery until the pancreas and liver functions returned to normal so they would be less chance of complications.
He sent me to the Portsmouth Navy hospital to have an Endoscopic Retrograde Cholangiopancreatography (ERCP) on Monday. They removed the stones from the common bile duct and sent me back to Langley AFB hospital. I was feeling much better on Tuesday. By now, I haven’t had any food or drink for almost 3 days, just IV fluids. The doctor let me have some liquids. Oh boy, hospital broth, mmmmmm and jello! Wednesday afternoon they did a laparoscopic gall bladder removal. They made four small incisions to perform the procedure. Everything went well. I saw pictures the next day. In addition to having many stones, my gall bladder was about twice as large as normal. I came home Thursday afternoon with a big bottle of percocet for the pain. The pain has been manageable and I’ve been trying to stretch as much as possible and walking around the neighborhood. I had a liquid diet for a couple days when I got home but started solid food on Saturday. They gave me two weeks of convalescent leave so I won’t be back to work until Feb 13. I’m curious to see how this will affect my ability to digest food and how I’ll have to modify my diet in the future.
Anyone else gone through this? How's it affected your life?
