The Hormone Diaries Part 7: The Gallbladder Attack

Before I completely forget, I really want to record a memory of a really important day of my life.

About six weeks ago on 6 September 2021, I started feeling a bit of back pain throughout the day at work. I thought maybe I just strained it moving furniture or cleaning or something as it was a dull ache that I was able to pay no attention to. Later that day I went to my mum’s house for dinner like I do every Monday night and decided to leave a bit earlier than normal at 7pm as my stomach was hurting and I thought I just needed to go to bed early and sleep it off. I tossed and turned in agony for about half an hour as the discomfort worsened.

I felt the need to throw up after that and from that moment on I threw up about 4 times within an hour, had a small reprieve from about 9-11pm and then after that woke up every 45 minutes or so to be sick. Eventually it became orange bile that I was throwing up, as all food I had consumed had already been thrown up.

Thinking this was very abnormal and unlike any illness I had ever experienced, I shook it off just thinking that I had food poisoning which was why I had been throwing up so much.

After getting only 2 hours of solid sleep that night, I woke up about 5am and decided to have a shower and wash my hair as I felt gross after the night I experienced. About 6am I tried calling my boss (he’s an early riser) to say I would only come in for a couple of hours to finish the 3 submissions I had due that day (they were 90% complete) but he didn’t answer. I sat on the lounge downstairs for about half an hour waiting to try calling him again. My flatmates were concerned – one of them had only had a few hours sleep as she heard me being sick all night, and she was trying to convince me to go to the hospital. I was reluctant as I had never been to the hospital for anything apart from a planned surgery for wisdom teeth removal in 2015.

I saw my colleague Sarah was active on Facebook messenger so I messaged her to see if she could take over one of my submission that was due at work as I was going to go home early as I was sick and she said it was no problem.

I called my boss again at 6:30 and he answered this time. I explained that I had a really rough night being sick all night and would only come in for a few hours to finalise the submissions we had due and then I would go home and rest. He was concerned but I think we both didn’t realise how sick I actually was at the time.

About 7am my flatmate was just about ready to go to work but kept insisting she would take me to the hospital if I wanted her to. After a lot more nudging I agreed to go. I got changed, grabbed my sick bowl and some tissues and got in her car. The drive there was torture. Fortunately, the hospital is only ten minutes away from our house but with every roundabout I was praying that I wouldn’t be sick again.

I was very grateful she came with me as she had taken herself to the hospital’s emergency room a few times and knew where to go. When we got to the desk the lady asked me so many questions. Due to the lack of sleep and how much pain I was in I struggled to answer the most basic of questions. I remember when they asked my address so they could input my details, I just handed over my license with the address on the back so I didn’t have to say it.

After about ten minutes of answering questions, we finally sat down and waited for my name to be called. I found an empty set of seats and laid down as it felt better than sitting. It was very uncomfortable though so I was still struggling.

Another ten minutes later my name was called. The nurse took some blood (site note: she found my vein so quick, most people struggle so I was impressed, especially because of how dehydrated I was at the time). Right as I sat down I felt the need to be sick again, and I threw up some yellow bile – a change from the orange that I saw all night but fortunately that was the last time I threw up.

After the blood test she took me back to the waiting room and gave me some dissolvable tablets to stop the nausea. Fortunately it worked as I didn’t throw up again for the rest of the day. As I was in the waiting room with my friend again, I decided to call my mum and tell her I was in hospital. She immediately sounded worried and asked if I wanted her to come and I said yes and started crying. Every bit of strength that was holding me together fell apart in that moment.

I also called some colleagues to tell them I can’t do the submissions as I was at hospital not well and that Sarah would finish them for me.

The nurse called my name again and took me into the emergency room. I was really shocked at how loud the room was but also how calm all the staff were. An elderly lady was in the next spot over to me and had clearly had a fall of some kind and seemed to be confused about where she was and the nurse was trying to explain everything to her. The patience and kindness she showed the lady was really impressive and made me feel like I was in good hands.

A nurse came and took all my information again and gave me a gown to change into. It was about 20 minutes until my mum got there – again, so lucky we live so close to each other and the hospital.

She was so worried and none of us knew what actually was making me feel sick. I knew I had some existing health conditions that I had told them about – PCOS, NAFLD, gallstones, and four days prior I had my first dose of the Pfizer vaccine. I didn’t connect any of those things to the sickness I had been experiencing for over 12 hours at this point.

About half an hour after my mum arrived, the nurses gave me some pills – I believe they said it was endone to help with the pain. Surprisingly they didn’t put me on a drip or anything the whole day, despite the amount of fluids I’d lost. The endone was crushed up in some yogurt as I said I can’t swallow a full pill and as I started eating it I started crying. It was not about my current health situation or being in hospital, but stress about work. I am literally in hospital with an unknown condition that has caused immense pain for 12 hours and I’m worried about work. The nurses and my mum were trying to comfort me but I couldn’t stop crying and felt so guilty that I wouldn’t be able to submit everything I had to that day. Reflecting back on this moment I’m so shocked and angry at myself that my body was screaming at me and was suffering, and I still had an internal voice that cared about work.

I am not sure if it was a way of being in denial about what was happening, but I think my current job has turned me into a bit of a work zombie. When I first started this job, it was quite slow; I had certain tasks I had to do each day or week and I quickly mastered them so I had a lot of spare time. The people I worked with didn’t handover a lot of tasks to me that they should have in those early days, as I think they were used to doing everything themselves. It’s five years later and I always have things to do and deadlines to meet almost daily. Work doesn’t stop. The slow days are only a few each year, so my body has gotten used to a certain lifestyle and quantity of work I need to complete.

In reflection I think my body was exhausted, overworked, and needed to break down in order to force me to rest and repair the damage that had been done. It was fighting extra inflammation (above my already highly inflamed state) due to the vaccine and stress from the weeks leading up to this day which is what caused me to be sick.

Shortly after, Dr. Luke arrived. Sometimes I find medical professionals really cold and their energy can somehow hurt or offend me and make me feel even more vulnerable but he was very sweet and kind so I was happy he was my doctor. He asked me a lot of questions about the pain I had and did some testing and feeling around to see what hurt and what didn’t. The upper right stomach area seemed to be the only problem so he said I would need to get an ultrasound and he would book it in for 11am (it was about 9:30).

I tried to get some rest now that some of the pain had subsided while my mum sat in the chair waiting with me for 11am to arrive. Mum called my boss again and said I won’t make it into work as I wouldn’t be leaving hospital anytime soon.

I tossed and turned a bit more, posted a photo on Instagram of me in hospital, and tried to get some rest. When I next looked at my phone I had so many messages of people asking what had happened and why I was in hospital. It was really sweet, made me feel like people cared and were worried about me.

It is kind of weird being in hospital as a 29-year-old single woman. You expect for some reason when you will be in hospital that you will have a husband or boyfriend that will take you and be there with you. Instead, I had my mum there and a tribe of 30 women praying for me. It made me feel mixed feelings, sad that I didn’t have a partner, but so blessed that I had so many women that cared about me. One thing I really noticed through this experience is that women care. There’s a reason we are the caretakers. Women have an innate sense of empathy and truly value the people and relationships in their lives which is why I felt so blessed to have them in my life. My brother was the only male I know that checked up on me or asked how I was doing throughout the whole experience. It really showcased the difference in our make up and our conditioning and gave me a lot to reflect on.

Eventually someone came to get me and told me that it was time for my ultrasound. I think it was about 11:15am. They wheeled me down the halls in a wheelchair and then I sat outside the ultrasound room for another 15 minutes. It was really cold and awkward as there weren’t many people around while I was waiting. It was a true moment of silence though, no devices, no people to talk to, no one to perform or show off for. It is so rare that I ever have a moment without a device to connect to people. I really need to make time for that in my life as I am constantly distracting myself with anything I can. It’s something we all do to cope and escape but I think that hinders me sometimes.

The ultrasound took about half an hour and again I have to say, the guy that did it was so nice and helpful. I cannot speak highly enough of every single person I encountered at the hospital – they were calm, helpful, good listeners and genuinely wanted to help.

After the ultrasound I was moved to some sort of shared recovery room where I stayed for a few hours while we waited for the results. I started to feel a lot better around 2pm but still very weak. Evnetually Doctor Luke came back and said the ultrasound looked overall good and it seemed like the gallbladder attack (or acute cholecystitis) was caused by gallstones that got stuck but they had since moved and looked a bit better.

I definitely think the inflammation that led to the gallbladder attack was caused by the COVID-19 vaccine that I had just a few days prior. I did a small bit of research and it seemed as though a few people had the same reaction, although not widely spread. 

Since the gallbladder attack I have had a dull ache in that region that is constant but does have moments of flaring up more, but never leading to the awful pain, nausea and vomiting I experienced during the gallbladder attack. Overall I am feeling much better but a bit traumatised from the experience as I have never been in hospital for anything except a wisdom teeth removal day surgery before.

I can’t talk highly enough about the medical professionals I encountered at the hospital, they were absolutely brilliant the whole day and I gained even more respect for them.