Goodnight gall, goodnight bladder

Surgery is over, gall bladder is out, and I am finally home. Due to some bleeding I had to stay overnight in the hospital. Apparently the gall bladder was stuck to the liver and when they yanked it out the bleeding began. So I stayed overnight which was fine due largely to some wonderfully mothering nurses with their ice chips and morphine. I was hoping for a sponge bath but perhaps I set my sights too high. Nurses don't do that I guess. But nurses work hard and whatever they get paid it's not enough. I was largely silent in my delirium so it's not like I was bothering them, but I could hear people vomiting and groaning elsewhere and if I had to put up with that every day I'd go nuts. So more money for nurses. And more sponge baths for patients.

Morphine, by the way, is awesome and I can totally understand why someone might get hooked on it. I felt really good in addition to not feeling any pain, and when they switched me to percoset that was fine but morphine, yeah, a little euphoria going on there. That's not something I have every day.

And then I guess because I'm inappropriate or stupid, or both, when I got home I took my prescription to to the pharmacy, and when he asked me what I need, I said, "Some delicious percocets please." The lesson I learned today is that the pharmacist (who sees me just about every morning waiting for the bus) doesn't like to joke about drugs. My bad. Now give me my drugs bitch cause I need to get high and go online. W00t!!1!

My Gall Bladder Myself

Funny thing happened when, after a week of calling and waiting, and finally being told officially that yes, I have gallstones. I was told to get them out as soon as possible and was referred to a surgeon. I was asked first if I have preference for surgeons and I said my only preference was for someone who could successfully locate said organ and then, with equal success, remove the fucking thing. In short, no, I do not have a surgeon on retainer and would thus need my doctor to recommend one. So the girl who works at the office gave me the name and number of someone who does this all the time.

After leaving a message at the surgeon's office, I got a call back and the woman asked me when I want to schedule my colonoscopy.

Eh? Is that necessary? It's not really connected to my gall bladder.

She says, "We do colo-rectal surgery here."

Oh my. Well that's very different than what I need. Ok then, back to my other doctor.

Haha, the office is closed until Monday. Please call back.

Oh I will. You can bet I will.

I wonder if my doctor was even looking at the results of my tests. For all I know, he could have me confused with someone who has...I don't know, a really diseased ass or something.

In any event, no more attacks since I've basically been eating veggies and everything low fat. And I'm slightly less fat too so in that way we're all winners in this.

Last night was at a Moroccan restaurant with about 25 of Eulalia's teacher colleagues, something I usually avoid lest I be subjected to endless discussions of English department protocols and tales of student papers, but given there were so many people I could move around when that sort of thing started.

Then the belly dancer showed up, which made it vastly more interesting than if, say, a juggler had shown up. I drank a lot, she made me dance (she made me, I swear, I would never dance in public. Never!)

Sometime during the belly dancer's shimmying the guy next to me was talking about Ralph Nader and getting him on the ballot, and yes, he should be allowed on the ballot, I voted for Ralph before, he's the only one addressing the real issues, etc., and before I knew it, this morning the doorbell rang and there he was, the guy from last night, he was in my living room with a bunch of petitions for me to get signed. He wants me to stand out on the street and collect signatures for Ralph.

Wha?

Apparently I will agree to anything if there is a belly dancer and a bottle of wine in front of me. I smell a conspiracy.

Also, I'm not collecting signatures. I love Ralph and all, but I hate being approached by people with clipboards while I'm going somewhere, and I'd rather not be on the receiving end of that hatred. Our democracy needs fixing, but I don't think I'm going to be the one to fix it.

However, if Ralph can recommend someone to take out my gall bladder without going in through my ass, I'll get him some signatures.

Gallstones: A Love Story

Another night, another blinding attack. I rode this one out and it only lasted an hour, but it was the longest hour of my life. There was a point at which I was ready for the emergency room, but I'm glad I didn't go since the pain stopped at about the time I probably would have seen a doctor. My doctor is booked until Monday so I have to watch what I eat until then.

I think the problem was some delicious Indian food I had for dinner. I thought it was low in fat but I guess I was wrong. The gall bladder helps break down fat that's eaten, and if there's a stone in the way, bile can't be excreted and then the pain begins.

What this all means to me is lots of vegetables. Yummy, delicious vegetables, which I love anyways.

And hopefully no more pain. Pain not delicious.

Hey Cugat, how's your gall bladder?

Well it's just fine thanks, I think, although I can't be sure until I see my doctor this week. Saturday night after eating some delicious sushi, I started having stomach pains. I let it go for a while but then the pain just got worse and worse. It was all radiating from my right side toward the center. Definitely not indigestion.

After two hours of moaning and trying to lie down and make it go away by using my awesome mental skillz, I decided I couldn't take it anymore, woke Eulalia, and said I need to go to the emergency room. Given the location of the pain, and the intensity, I was thinking appendicitis.

We got to the Penn ER, forms were filled out, I was asked to rate my pain on a scale of 1 to 10 (I went with an 8 since I have taken a shot to the nads and that ranks a 10), agonizing waiting occurred, and I was finally brought to an exam room where I waited a really long time for a doctor. In the meantime, I listened to a doctor loudly ask someone, "How much did you drink? A whole bottle of whiskey? OK."

OK indeed. Then the second worst thing happened that could have happened. The pain went away while I waited for a doctor.

Based on the amount of time I spent watching The Godfather on the little exam room tv, it was probably 45 minutes that I waited. I just wanted to sneak out at that point and say "Never mind," but I knew I couldn't do that.

When the doctor finally came in I told him what was going on. Given that the pain stopped, he ruled out appendicitis and after pressing on my stomach a while said that it was possibly gall stones.

Oy vey. I didn't even know what my gall bladder does until I obsessively read about it today. Now I might actually have an old person disease.

At least I'll be an old person in fairly good shape.

Now where's my ear horn and orthopedic shoes?

And get off my lawn.

Ouchy

Me on my bike vs. pile of wet leaves on a steep downhill.



















Winner: wet leaves.

Do Not Want

Thanks to my allergies, I started taking something called Singulair. It's an asthma medicine that, my doctor said, also helps with the coughing and sneezing of which I was doing so much. What he didn't tell me is that it has a litany of side effects, most notably leg cramps and hallucinations (which I was kind of looking forward to but didn't have). When the allergies subsided I stopped taking it and was fine until about a week ago when the sneezing and coughing started again, so I got back to throwing down the little yellow pills.

Then I got a really bad sore throat and clogged ears which I thought was a cold coming on, but I didn't have any other symptoms. I thought I would ride it out, but day after day I was having trouble eating and swallowing (which is not the worst thing in the world for me right now) and when the cold didn't develop I checked the list of side effects again and--GAH!--my sore throat and ear problems were from the Singulair.

So now I've stopped taking it again and my ears and throat have cleared up. But WTF? This shit has a lot of problems associated with it. (Thinning hair? I'll take the constant coughing instead.) So no more prescription drugs for me.

I'm not taking any drugs that I can't buy from a guy in a wool cap with a runny nose and shaky hands.

Feel better!

I've been nursing a cold since I got back from my trip. I usually like to just ride these things out but I was hacking up a spleen last night and hardly slept and I guess this morning it looked that way. So I was saying goodbye to our house guest when she said, quite emphatically, "Feel better." I said ok, thanks, and she repeated "FEEL BETTER!"

Ok, ok, jeez, I will. I promise.

So what's the deal with people saying that? Do they think I'm intentionally feeling lousy, like it's a choice? Or that I will continue to feel sick unless ordered to feel otherwise?

I don't like that expression. I think it's the "Have a nice day" of the early 21st century.