Gallbladders: Part 5 - the removal

Hello, lovelies.  It's time for another episode of Ms. Daisy and the Gallbladders (yes, that is my band name).

If you are already quite familiar, this post is one part in a series of five spanning about a six month period.  You may be surprised to see the title, but (as usual) I've got the whole story for you, coming right up.

If you've been reading along, you've seen the absolutely DELIGHTFUL journey we've had in Galbladderlandia - the enzymes, the flush, the naturopaths, the chiropractors, the Hulda zapping, the veganism, the Beta Fooding, the quinoa, the detox baths, the accupressure, and much more.  We have apple cider vinegar in bulk for chugging after meals here.  I have fifty kinds of Standard Process supplements that should have helped the hubby and his little buddy, Mr. Gallbladder.

HOWEVER.

Ewwwwwwwwwww, gross stuff.

After the first gallbladder attack where my hubby got a gallstone stuck in his bile duct and turned yellow, we figured his body was just a teensy bit perhaps trying to tell us something.  So we opened the tools in the toolbox - the regular doctor, the surgeon, the chiro, the naturopath, and a doctor of integrative medicine.  I went crazysauce on researching herbal remedies, detoxification and cleanses.

As you may be aware, we aren't the type around here to just hop onto the surgical bandwagon first thing.  I find that to be rather disturbing, actually.  So, we avoided it like the plague for as long as we could.

The flush worked well.  It got out the gallstones.  In fact, if having gallstones is your only problem, I highly recommend that you get on that bus and ride.  Do the Hulda lemon, olive oil thang and you will be amazed.

But, unfortunately, for my hubby, we found out that gallstones were not the problema.  Mr. Gallbladder was a sick, sick puppy.  

I am the sort to ask a surgeon if I may see the organ or if I may not, if I may please see pictures of the organ.  (I can hear half of you shaking your heads saying, "I am zero percent shocked." from here.)  And that is what Mr. Surgeon did.  Now, if you're wondering, we did not go to Surgeon Dr. McStupidpants, we went to one that actually had (how shall I say this) a brain. 


It was distressing to me, to be quite honest, to think how we failed at rescuing Mr. Gallbladder.  I suppose that the signals of bad digestion he was experiencing twenty years ago as a teenager should have been paid attention to, but they were not.  And I wasn't around then, and I did not think the way I do now back then, even if I were to be some random other teenager running up to him, begging him to not eat like a human garbage disposal.

Poor little Mr. Gallby, getting ripped off of the liver bed.

At any rate, when he had a reaction to almond milk and hemp cereal, I looked deep within myself and wondered if I was going to end up killing my hubby if I didn't suggest that we get rid of the nasty thing.  He was afraid if it went gangrenous that it would murder his pancreas and harm his liver.  At around 2:00 a.m. after the hemp cereal gallbladder attack, I finally said the words I thought I'd never say, "I think it might be time, honeybearsweetiesnookemsdeary."  (Or something like that.)

He called the surgeon and begged for a date to get in that would not be a month and a half away and graciously (for crying out loud, the guy is getting paid like one bamillion jillion dollars for a fifteen minute procedure, so I guess he figured it would be okay, especially since dear hubbsters was practically crawling on gravel in front of him) he agreed.  (He was going on vay-cay-cay for like a month.)  

The day approached and my waif of a husband was ready.  Sorta.  He so hates hospital stuff.  It makes him think of croaking.  And he didn't want to croak.  Yes, he did read all of the possible things that could go wrong during a surgery (like having your bowels severed and you die instantly), so he was prepared.  The poor guy got stabbed in some nerve because a young and new nurse thought he ought not have pain meds to insert his port thingy since he said he had issues with novocaine.  (It wasn't related to novocaine, and his arm still hurts weeks later.)

Thank the Lord, all went as well as could be expected and he is healing well.  I gave him chicken broth after his surgery and he was so starving that he thought I had pretty much made him the best meal in the history of the entire universe.  Poor guy.

He seems to be on the mend and back to his wily ways - yesterday (I KID YOU NOT) he picked up some pazcki's for some customers and had a half one himself.  (Hello and welcome to Revoltingland.)

And by "other", we mean "filled with partially hydrogenated poison".

We got word from the follow-up appointment that Mr. Gallbladder got sent off to be tested in the lab.  Hubsters asked about the state of it, and what was found out.  He had mentioned to the surgeon that he felt surprisingly well, and had not had any bowel issues (this is a common issue with people who have their gallbladder removed).  The surgeon replied, "Yes.  Well.  That is because we found out at the lab that your gallbladder was functioning at ZERO PERCENT."  I guess that whole looking yellow thing was a jolly decent sign it was not happy, either.

So, my friends, this ends the saga of the gallbladder.  I still will stand by most all of you and tell you to fight for yours.  Try everything.  Don't go jumping on the surgery bandwagon unless you've done it all.  You can't get it back, it is a one way street.  And then you have the issue of worrying about absorbing fat-soluble vitamins.  Consider carefully and be wise, lovies.

Peace, love and be well,
Ms. Daisy

Gallbladder: Part 4 - The Flush

Good gravy, my friends.  Gallbladders are something else.  I have been on the ride with the gallbladder for quite a while now in the vicarious way through my dear hubby.

Last week (ish), hubby went to a crazy genius triple doctorate doctor who exclaimed wildly that, "This is easy!" and recommended a liver flush.

This is the story of said flush and its results.

According to this flush, hubby needed to prep by doing two things - taking Standard Process phosfood and drinking raw organic apple juice.  Gallstones are part calcium and part cholesterol balls.  The bigger, harder ones are made of more calcium.  Phosfood is a phosphorus supplement - and since calcium and phosphorous are on the see-saw together, when you bump your phosphorus up, you can drop the calcium (and thus, softening the gallstones).  Otherwise, there is a component within raw organic apple juice that is called malic acid - this puppy shrinks those gallstones like nobody's beeswax.

He had to drink at least 6 cups (48 oz. +) of the apple juice for three days.  Some flushes say that on the third day, you fast except for drinking apple juice, but the one we were following did not say that (which made hubby really happy because he loves food).  

So, the night of the flush, I mixed up a lovely concoction (according to the directions of the flush) of 8 oz. organic extra virgin olive oil and the juice of a lemon and a half.  I shook it up in a jar for him to slightly emulsify it.  I don't know why.  I just felt bad, I guess, and I thought this would make it look nicer.

He drank it around 10:00 p.m. and then he laid down on his right side (that's what we were told he ought to do) for 30 minutes.  This was the time of nervousness.  Up to this point, hubby has had severe issues with his gallbladder when he ate fat.  And now he just drank a cup of olive oil.  He was freaking out that he was going to have an attack.  But don't worry, he didn't.

He tried to go to sleep.  I kept twitching when I was falling asleep so I kept him awake, but hey, I could not help it.  It's how I roll.  Eventually he fell asleep, but it was a light sleep and not of very good quality.

At 4:00 a.m., he woke up.  Since he was awake, he tried to go to the bathroom.  No gallstones.  But now he felt a little nauseous.  He was sure it wasn't going to work and he was just going to barf his guts out.

At 7:00 a.m., he woke up again.  Bathroom, yes.  Gallstones, no.

At 9:00 a.m., he went in for another bathroom party and guess what?  Gallstones, baby!  Those gross little puppies were floating!  We were not like other people who save them and put them on paper towels and take pictures of them, I am sorry to report to you.  If you'd like, I'll tell you that they were green and small and floated.

After this, he decided to try to have a little bit of a pancake.  It was the first time that he had eaten anything since August and his stomach didn't do flips and turns and churns and burgles.  He was so happy he could have said, "Hooray."  But I am more the spaz in the relationship, so he didn't say anything and I said, "YAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!".

At lunch he ate some other food and he said he felt normal.  He was very happy about this.

At dinner he ate spicy food and even took a bite of my grass-fed burger (something that was an instant trigger for him before) and felt fine.  (He's a daring fellow, eh?  Actually, I don't think he could stand the smell of the deliciousness without giving it a try.)

He did say that he felt a little sore on his right side, but it was not the way that it used to be.  I am happy to say that he thought it was not a big deal, although he initially thought it was going to kill him and his face off.  

If you are going to do it, let me encourage you to try it.  It's basically like you're just having a gulp of some delicious lemony dressing and just try to think that you're a brave, brave wild person and try to get through it.

We are more than a week out and he has had no gallbladder attacks (phew), lessened gallbladder pain (hooray! He says it is not the same pain.  It's like it is a sore muscle.  It used to be that when food touched his tongue, it would FREAK OUT.) and he is able to eat foods he was not daring to try before.  He is going to do the flush again, this time the official Dr. Hulda Clark flush - to see if it will increasingly improve.

(Speaking of Hulda, do you know about this lady?  She wrote a book called The Cure for All Diseases.  She's very interesting indeed.)

I'll keep you posted.

Peace, love and flush that thang!
Ms. Daisy

Gallbladder: Take 3

If you aren't aware, hubby has gallbladder issues.  He experienced his first serious gallbladder attack where a stone got stuck in a tube and he turned yellow in August.  We've been on the exploration for a solution ever since.

We went to see many different people - one was Dr. Stupidpants, a surgeon, who couldn't even open up an ultrasound file to look at the films and whose suggestion was, "I cut you here, here, here and here."  Oh, wow.  That is soooo helpful.  Thank you for your wise and astute intelligent remarks.  Great jorb, Hamstray.

We went to the naturopath.  She prescribed some Betafood (by Standard Process) and Phosfood (that stuff - if you have gallbladder issues, GET IT.  Like, run.  Now.  Don't be without it.  I am pretty sure it saved him three times at least.  You can take it as soon as you are having an attack.  But, wash your mouth out after you swig it down with water - or whatever you took it in - because the phosphorus is on the other side of calcium in your body and you don't want to ruin your teeth.), and some other things.  One of which pretty much was torture to him - he had to eat vegan, gluten free and fat-free for a week or two to press reset on his gallbladder.  This meant he got to eat extreme amounts of quinoa and veggies.  If you ever feel the need to lose about thirty pounds, apparently this is a quick way to do so. (By the way, he didn't need to lose 30 pounds, which is quite a disturbing thing to dear hubby.)

We explored integrative medicine and nutrition.  We did chiropractic.  I youtubed accupressure for him and gave him detox baths with pink Himalayan salts.  I researched essential oils that may help.  I fed him more quinoa.

More recently he's decided he's had quite enough.  It's been six months of gallbladdering and he is full of it.  He went to talk to a different surgeon this week to see what they would say.  (What do you think a surgeon would say to you?  They say to cut it out.  Um, duh.)

And today was the last strand of hope before no return.  He went to a very strange, quirky, arrogant, genius, experienced naturopath/physician.  He threw his arms in the air and exclaimed, "This is easy!"  

So.

We're going to try one more thing.  It is the cleanse.  Oh, you know about it.  If you've done any gallbladder reading, you've heard about the apple juice, olive oil, lemon juice (sometimes Epsom salt) thing.  People swear by this and say it will make you feel like a new person.

I'll report later and let you know how it goes.  Until then, if you want to be fascinated, youtube something like "gallbladder flush" and you will stare in horror and amazement.

I'll keep you posted!

Peace, love and healthy gallbladders please,
Ms. Daisy

1 gallbladder + 2 gallstones = surgery? Part 2

This is Part 2.  If you missed Part 1, please go here.

So after I nearly exploded from the irreprehensible behavior and carelessness of the surgeon, Dr. Stupidpants, I took a deep breath and got ready for the other end of the spectrum - a naturopath.

Have you ever seen a naturopath?  Rather, have you ever gone to a naturopath for health matters?  If you said no, well, I think you ought to try it.

Here's the thing.  You know how doctors now actually have no idea what is the original cause of your problem and they just want to give you prescription drugs to mask your symptoms?  Yeah, naturopaths don't do that.  They try to find out the source of what's wrong in your body and actually FIX it.  So weird, right?  I know.  It's like the hard work of being a detective and finding out what is wrong with individual people has gone by the wayside (isn't that a great phrase?  "The wayside".  Wow.  I bet there are whole piles of things on that wayside by all the talk I hear with that phrase!) and in its place we see roulette wheels of multicolored prescription pills.

When the prescriptions screw you up, you can get another prescription to fix the symptoms that were caused from trying to mask the original symptoms.  Wow.  It makes so much sense, doesn't it?

Yeaaah.

Anyway, back to the naturopath.  Some naturopaths do weird things, unconventional things...and these weird things strangely work.

For example.  Okay, you know how everything in the whole earth has some charge on it (positive, negative or neutral...is neutral considered a charge?  Anyway, you know what I mean.).  And our bodies are made up of chemical and electrical charges and flows - well, some people swear they can kind of tell what's going on somehow (I don't understand this science, so its all fuzzy from here).  (Not by boiling toads or doing weird witchy things.)  

ANYWAY.  I'll have to read more on that and report back to you some other time.  

My hubby had this constant smell of garlic in his nose.  (I thought he must have had some weird sinus infection or something.)  The naturopath said he was looking for phosphorus.  He took a liquid phosphorus (food) supplement for about 4 days and then one night the weird garlic smell went away.  The next morning he was going to take his supplement and he almost barfed.  His body got what it needed and told him in body language it was done with taking that.  He went in and asked her about it, she said the same thing.

In regards to the gallbladder, right now my poor hubster is eating a diet that he considers some kind of horrid sick torture.  It is a celiac vegan non-fat diet.  Basically, the poor guy can eat fruits, veggies...and quinoa.  My hubby is a foodie.  Steak, bacon, coffee, and cooking on the Big Green Egg are PASSIONS for him.  Now the poor guy has water and quinoa for breakfast.  It's a hard knock life.  But he's resting his gallbladder and his liver and getting stuff back into balance.

It's a heck of a lot better than the Dr. Stupidpants and his passion of slicing and dicing live humans in their gut regions option.

Keep your organs, peeps!

Peace, love and feel free to send any non-fat, vegan, celiac recipes right this way,
Ms. Daisy

1 gallbladder + 2 gallstones = surgery? Part 1

Howdy doody, m'peeps!  What I'm about to tell you here is some crazysauce with a cherry on top.  

It began like any other normal day...well, sorta.  For me.  For the hubby, it was a different story.  He woke up and went to a golf outing (please pity him for his unpleasant job).  Because my dear hubby is on an I.C. diet - that is, whatever "I see, I eat", he had a busy time of chomping it all up that day.  High fructose corn syrup cinnamon rolls made of 2198712 ingredients, inhumanely killed nitrate filled luncheon meats wrapped up in (I FREAKIN KID. YOU. NOT.) American "cheese" (which is pretty much the definition of our country's food ideals in all of its sick an vulgar glory being that it is NOT FOOD and is neon orange), antibiotic-injected ammonia washed diseased beef steaks, and the list continues.

Well for some reason (re-read with eyeballs bulging and the most sarcastic look on your face you can muster), he felt slightly unwell that evening after he came home.  The pain was severe.  He thought he was having the worst case of heartburn anyone could ever imagine.  He made me go to the store at 10:30 at night and buy poison for him, and by that I mean Tums and Pepcid, even though I was doing accupressure on his feet and offering him fennel tea.  (I returned the Tums and Pepcid, by the way, just in case you were wondering.)  Nothing helped.  Not even a little.

The next day (after sleeping very little), we had made plans to hang out with friends.  These friends are sweet and they made us a meal.  This meal included steak and a myriad of other things (including my homemade berry pie).  Being on the I.C. diet, he had a bit of everything.

And then we went to the E.R.

He was acting as if a sharp-clawed alien was crawling through his bellybutton and eating his organs from the inside out.  

They suggested he may have gallbladder issues.  But since the awesome ER was so busy, they couldn't see us and we ended up going home before being seen.  WAY TO GO.

The next day was Sunday and we called the on-call doctor.  She said that he sounded as if he may have gallstones and to make an appointment for the following day to come and get an ultrasound.

We did.  The ultrasound confirmed the presence of two gallstones.  The doctor (TOTALLY LIED) said we should talk to this surgeon, not because he would need to have surgery necessarily, but because this guy was a gallbladder specialist.  (LIES TO THE EXPONENTIAL MILLIONTH POWER.)

Today we went to talk to the charlatan surgeon.  Remember the time I found out my Dad was spraying mercury on his throat and I was about to invent new swear words?  Chalk this up as a similar day.  

I have to tell you this because I am about to die of implosion if I don't.  This guy was the maniac psycho that L.L. Cool J must have been talking about in Mama Said Knock You Out.  Yep, f'realies.

We go in.  We sit in A CLOSET.  Yes. Not kidding.  It had a mini-exam table in it and a bi-fold door and made you feel like a very important person NOTATALL.  Dr. Surgeon McStupidpants comes in, shakes our hands and asks my husband how old he is.  He looks at the form my husband just filled out for him and remarks, "You're healthy!"  He draws a picture of a liver, a stomach, a gallbladder and a pancreas.  He points to the gallbladder and says, "This, you don't need this.  It's for nothing.  Lie down."

My husband lays back on the table (as we play Twister trying to get around each other in the closet to trade places).  Dr. McStupidpants pulls up his shirt and says, "I cut you here, here, here and here.  Very easy.  You be back home - one day!  Here, do the paperwork."

Ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmwhatthecrapjusthappenedhere?

I interrupt Dr. Stupidpants, "Excuse me, Dr. Stupidpants (I only thought that bit), what percent of patients still have gallstones after their gallbladder is removed?"  (I have been researching, my peeps!  It happens.  The liver takes over your gallbladder's function and you can get them again, except for now, you're totally screwed since if you take out your liver you instantly die.)

Do you know what this joker says?  "ZERO PERCENT!  Gallbladder all gone, goes to gallbladder heaven, ha ha ha!  Keep in a jar, ha ha ha!  Say, 'Look! Big gallstone!'"

This dorkface had now lost all credibility possible.  My husband had to ask him to look at the ultrasound pictures (which he could not figure out how to open) to see his gallbladder to see if we may determine a) how many gallstones there are and b) what is the current state of the gallbladder and c) if there is anything of note we should be aware of.  

Did he talk about the function of the gallbladder?  No.

Did he ask us if we had any questions?  No.

Did he offer any options besides "I cut you here, here, here and here"?  No.

Did he look at my husband's anatomy before deciding on surgically removing his gallbladder?  NO.

Did he tell the truth about possible complications post-surgery?  No.

Did he put us in a closet?  Yes.

If I would have looked at him pensively and asked him to take out my gallbladder too, would he have?  YES.

Did he have awards on his wall saying he was a great doctor?  Yes.

Was his mom apparently on the council that decided to give him that award?  Who knows, she's probably dead, he probably took out all of her organs and threatened the others who were voting on it, "You say no, I cut you here, here, here and here!"

Yep.  Next time, I'll tell you what we ended up doing.  Let me give you a clue: it wasn't getting surgery with this joker.

Peace, love and I punch him here, here, here and here,
Ms. Daisy