“But you’re not fair, fat and forty – what makes you think you’ve got gallstones?” This is what the doctor said to me when I told him I was there to see him because I had gallstones.

Apparently, fair skinned, overweight people around 40 years of age are the most common sufferers of gallstone attacks. But you can have gallstones or have a gallstone attack outside of these demographics.

My story

I was 31 when I was diagnosed with gallstones and told I needed surgery urgently. I was about 121 lb (55kg) – painfully thin for my height – and couldn’t eat anything that didn’t make my stomach, back and shoulder ache, throb or just plain hurt.

Evenings were worse than morning. After being told I had gallstones, I had to wait 5 weeks to see the surgeon because I didn’t have health insurance. Although the intern at the hospital said, if you feel you can’t cope, come straight to hospital and we will do an emergency operation.

I was also told that if I had to have emergency surgery I forfeited my option of having keyhole surgery. An emergency operation would mean that I would have a large cut and there was more risk involved.

Keyhole surgery is where the surgeon makes 4 cuts in the abdomen and inserts surgical instruments, a camera and drains to perform the surgery with as little trauma as possible.

Although, the abdomen is tender after keyhole surgery – it is not as painful as a large abdominal wound. Also, the time in hospital is much less with keyhole surgery. Instead of 5-7 days, keyhole surgery could be as little as 36 hours.

Each night I waited to see the surgeon, I thought to myself – can I get through the night without dying. If its still bad in the morning, I’ll go to the hospital. By morning, I was always much improved.

My remedy for the pain

Each night I would do a visualization before going to sleep. I would flood the abdomen with blue light and then imagine that all the gallstones were put in a sack so that none of them could escape and block the tube that takes the bile into the stomach. I then filled the sack with green healing light until it brightened into a flash of white light.

I expected that this would keep me safe for another day while I waited to see the surgeon.

[If I had my time over again, I would not wait so long to see the surgeon - and I would take the cold pressed virgin olive oil and fresh lemon juice remedy described in an earlier blog.]

After surgery – more pain!

After surgery, it is not uncommon for patients to experience pain similar to a gallstone attack. If you experience this sort of pain – you need to check with your doctor that there aren’t any complications. Sometimes – there is no known cause for this pain … possibly it is a phantom pain.

I experienced this pain for quite some months after surgery – but ultrasounds revealed no cause for it. The surgeon said that they can’t explain why this sometimes happens.

I changed my diet to exclude fatty food – and everything settled down eventually.

This website – gallbladderattack.com – has excellent information about the gallbladder and what to eat and what not to eat – before and after surgery.

If you do have to have surgery – I highly recommend that you purchase the Before After Surgery Toolbox.