Gall Bladder Surgery

In 2003 my wife began experiencing extremely painful stomach aches. We didn't know what was causing them at first, but after a while she began to associate the stomach aches with eating fat, and so she went on a no-fat diet. I think she couldn't eat fat for a few weeks; one time she tried to eat a piece of bread with only one gram of fat and it gave her a stomach ache. I remember her diet consisting of rice cakes, white rice and fat free fudgecicles (she was never a big fan of rice, but now she likes it even less). I think she lost 15 or 20 pounds. I was eating a vegetarian diet at the time, and as a show of solidarity I decided to join her in the no fat diet. But empathy apparently wasn't a good enough reason to stick to it, because after a week or two I found myself so starved for fat that I grabbed a spoon and started eating store-bought cookie dough right out of the package. It wasn't one of my best moments :)

The reason Gail couldn't eat fat was because she had a diseased gall bladder. She was scheduled for surgery and I asked my mom to watch the kids so I could go with her. It was a laparoscopic surgery, meaning that it was done with small incisions and surgical cameras instead of a large incision, and her gall bladder was removed through her belly button. When my grandmother had her gall bladder removed years ago she had a large incision and had to be in bed for 6 weeks while she recovered, so it was good that my wife didn't have to go through that.

I remember pacing nervously in the waiting room during the surgery and praying that everything would go well. I tried to read, but it was hard to focus. The surgery took a little over an hour, and when they brought her to her hospital room I was waiting for her. She was in more pain than I've ever seen her in before; in fact, I've never seen anyone in that kind of pain. I remember her grabbing my hand and almost breaking it because she was hurting so badly. They injected morphine into her IV and she started feeling better almost immediately.

During the whole experience, from start to finish, I felt quite close to Gail. I have always perceived her as a very independent person, and since I am someone who enjoys helping people with their problems I've sometimes felt like she doesn't need me very much. But when she was going through that ordeal with her gall bladder the need was clear and I felt like I could finally step in and make a real difference for her. So I tried to be there every step of the way, from the no-fat diet and initial doctor visits to the surgery and her subsequent recovery. In a very unexpected way, my wife's gall bladder troubles helped our marriage become stronger.