Galling matters ...

My internal organs generally aren't fodder for the ol' blog, but apparently this makes for an interesting story, or at least one that needs to be told since people who had seen me less than 24 hours earlier playing crimson hostess at Collin's birthday party were getting poorly punctuated texts from the emergency room and had no clue what the hell was going on. To this day, I still don't know what the hell was going on -- and I was the star of this painful little show.

So here's the gist: I no longer have a gallbladder.

And here's what happened.

I had been getting occasional late-night heartburn/gas pains for the past few months, but didn't think much of it other than that I had been eating too late. Chris thought it was strange that cereal was giving me such horrible pains, at 4 a.m. no less, but I didn't think anything was wrong. Or, more specifically, I didn't want to think anything was wrong. But when I had a particularly bad bout in April that landed me on the bathroom floor all morning and caused me to miss my friend Leanne's baby shower, I said I would make a doctor's appointment after Collin's birthday.

So the days passed, and all of a sudden, it was May 30 -- the day I had been working toward for months. It was Collin's first birthday, and there was food and goodie bags and decorations, oh my. The party was wonderful, and I was feeling great about pulling it off on minimal sleep.

That night, I assembled some of Collin's new toys, and then went to bed a little earlier than usual. Around 3 a.m., I was racing to the bathroom to throw up. Greeeatttt, I figured, I had gotten food poisoning from eating leftover taco dip from the party. It must have sat out too long, and now I was paying the price for wanting a snack while I watched TV that night.

But it didn't end there. Usually, with food poisoning, you throw up a few times, and once it's out of your system, you pass out in a heap and feel quasi-better the next day. In this case, I threw up again. And again. And again. And I was had such horrible abdominal pains that I couldn't lay on my back. Or on my side. Or on my stomach. I was keeping Chris up with all of my thrashing around to the point that he was starting to get motion sickness. So I went to the couch. It didn't help. I threw up some more, and then went back to bed while he fled to the couch. I can't remember being in worse pain.

I didn't sleep a wink, and by 8 a.m., I was on the phone with a nurse from my doctor's office. She advised me to keep throwing up because it would eventually pass. But at that point, I had nothing left to throw up, and I was feeling worse. By 8:45, my mom was on the way to take me to Urgent Care while Chris stayed with Collin. The five minutes I stood at the door waiting for her were agonizing. I felt light-headed and shaky, and I didn't think I'd make it to the end of my driveway.

The doctor at Urgent Care said I needed a sonogram and that he would call the emergency room to let them know I was on the way. Now this is the part where it's pretty evident I thought I was about to die -- I am extremely hospital phobic -- childbirth helped, but I still freak out about "sick people" hospital stuff -- and here I was, readily agreeing to go.

I barely remember the ride down to Allenmore. I could barely walk out of Urgent Care, and my mom said I kept starting to drift off, and that she was starting to panic. She would talk to me to keep me awake, and I would get just annoyed enough to stay conscious. Why wouldn't she just let me sleep?! The next thing I really remember is half-sitting/half-laying on the admitting desk, and begging the woman to find someone to see me now.

Fortunately, Memorial Day isn't a busy holiday for hospitals -- no one carving their fingers off with the turkey or blowing themselves up with fireworks -- so within minutes, I was in an exam room, being poked, prodded and asked questions about everything from whether I could be pregnant to how much alcohol I drink and whether I have ever taken street drugs. (To clarify, the answers were: I hope not, not much, and absolutely not.) I felt better once they administered a shot of painkiller, and they eventually took me down for a sonogram.

The result: Gallstones. Lots of them.

But I'm only 27. And I'm in good health. How the hell did this happen?!

Turns out that "fertile females" are at high risk for gallstones, and I needed surgery to remove them.

Greeeatttt.

Even in my sleep-deprived, drugged state, I knew that this meant being away from Collin overnight for the first time EVER, weaning him immediately, staying in the hospital, and, oh yeah, being sliced into. The surgeon telling me that it was a laproscopic procedure wasn't much comfort, and I finally cried once he left the room.

Shortly after 3 p.m., I was rolled off to surgery with Chris walking beside my bed all the way down the hallway. Once beyond the heavy metal doors of the operating room, I remember sliding onto the table and asking the anesthesiologist if the shot he had just given me would knock me ... zzzzz.

I woke up in less pain than I had been in before -- despite having four incisions in my abdomen and an extremely sore throat. Do they just jam the damn breathing tubes in?!? The pain I had been feeling beforehand was worse than childbirth, and anyone who knows how my labor went will remember the whole stuck-head situation, so that's saying something. It turns out my gallbladder had been double the size it was supposed to be, and the wall was inflamed, too. My surgeon told Chris that he doubted I would have made it another 24 hours without it rupturing, and the result could have been catastrophic. So I am SO glad that I made the decision to go into the emergency room. I think it shows how I have grown as a person because I put my immediate needs before my extreme fears.

And speaking of, I managed to make it through an entire night alone in the hospital. Chris offered to stay with me, but I felt Collin should have at least one parent at home, so between the Vicodin and the jello, I survived by myself. I was scared, and I kept the TV on all night and didn't sleep much, but I did it. It helped that the nurses were really nice, including one who had an almost-1-year-old, and there were very few people on the floor, so it was quiet. And fortunately, Allenmore is the smaller of Tacoma's hospitals, so it's less impersonal and sterile and more like a community hospital.

I was discharged Tuesday afternoon, a mere 23 hours after having surgery. It was crazy how fast everything happened, but I am so glad that it did. I am so relieved to know that there was something definitive wrong with me, and that it was fixable. I'm not in pain anymore, and I haven't had any horrible pains since. I had to eat bland/low-fat food for a week, but now I am back to normal, and have had mild Indian food for dinner twice this week. I'm clearly making up for lost paneer. I am back to driving, and had my post-op appointment on Tuesday, where I was told that I am healing well. I guess it was a good omen having a surgeon named Dr. Schopp, pronounced like my favorite hobby.

Still, it's one hell of a way to keep me away from the Macy's Memorial Day sale.