A few weeks ago I went to the E.R. complaining of tremendous abdominal pain. After 2 hours at home hoping I wasn't going to have to go and then a 3-hour wait at the E.R., I was asymptomatic and the doc decided I had gastritis. This seemed unlikely to me as I eat quite well, don't drink much, and take OTC pain meds sparingly and never without food. Regardless, only one liver enzyme was elevated so they decided this was the most obvious thing. One week later, hello again E.R. This time I waited until the day shift so my hours of waiting in pain could be at home. I woke up Frank and off we went for round two. This time they saw me much more quickly and found that my liver enzymes and some other indicators were all over the place. My gallbladder was going to have to come out.
After a dose of morphine, all was right with the world. I didn't even need another dose until after I had a procedure that tore up my throat. The timeline, though, was eat dinner Monday night, go to the hospital Tuesday morning, tube down my throat Wednesday, gallbladder out Thursday, and home on Sunday. From Monday night until Friday morning I had nothing by mouth. At. All. It was not as hard as you'd imagine. It was harder, in fact, to make myself eat on Friday than it was to not eat the rest of the week. I lost 5 pounds the week after the first hospital visit because I was worried about another flare up and was halving my portions. The week of no food I lost another 5 and have lost a couple more since I've been out.
The hospital is no place to find paleo food. Because I was scared of eating much of anything I had some jello to start, then pudding, then plenty of bananas because I could order those ahead and eat a half of one with each dose of pain meds. I then switched to boiled eggs but only ate the whites because the fat seemed bad, and a stir-fry with no rice. Once out of the hospital it was back on the wagon, though, and I've done well save for some cheats after my lovely husband finished the Warrior Dash on Saturday.
I think I'm pretty much back to just eating paleo as I normally would because it doesn't seem to impact the back end what I put in the front end no matter how much I wish it would. My body just needs time to adjust its dealings with bile, it seems.
They couldn't give me any idea what made the stone dislodge and block my bile duct but it caused a lot of trouble. The extra days in the hospital were caused by a second suspect that was jacking up my liver enzymes. I've been told by folks that I could've done some kind of cleanse and likely been okay but, to be honest, it hurt like nothing I've ever experienced and I'm glad to have it over with. I'll be more glad when I'm healed up and not still sore. Regardless, I'm back to life again and happy I had paleo food to come home to from the hospital instead of the crap I'm sure a lot of people have to eat.
Today we had chicken on the grill. My favorite. What are you eating, my cave-like friends?
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