Hi! I’m wondering if anyone can tell me any *positive* gallbladder removal stories? I’m due to have my gallbladder removed privately next month and I’m looking for some reassurance as it does seem like some people online have some very negative stories. I never used to have any problems with my stomach (rarely did I get pain for anything), but upon giving birth to my son last year and experiencing some quick weight loss I developed these excruciating pains in my upper abdomen. I know gallstones can form in pregnancy, but my pain started a month after I gave birth and it was really only after I’d lost almost a stone in weight during a very short period of time. Unfortunately I was going through a very difficult time due to family issues. It was a very stressful period and after I gave birth I didn’t eat properly for a good month and when I tried to resume my normal eating habits (note: I actually love food and ate very well before all of this!) I found myself waking up at night with this horrible, dull ache under my rib cage on the right side. I found it to be worse than childbirth. Initially these attacks lasted around 3-4 hours but it wasn’t long before some started lasting 8-12 hours. I was wanting to eat all my usual favourite meals but when I did I would get this pain. I went to the doctor straight away and after ruling out some other causes, he concluded it was likely gallstones. I had an ultrasound but it didn’t actually find any gallstones so the result was pretty much inconclusive. So again I tried eating normally and had normal to large sized meals in addition to snacks and again the pain come back, to the extent I actually had a stone stuck in my bile duct for 2 days. The pain immediately went away when it passed and overall I think I coped pretty well - I’ve never had terrible nausea like a lot of people say they have, never had a fever with it, etc. except I obviously do find it extremely painful when I get these attacks. After that I ended up having another very bad attack in November last year, which resulted in another stone getting stuck. Again it passed on its own and I wasn’t seriously ill with it but the pain during the attack and whilst the stone was passing was almost unbearable. By this point gallstones had been diagnosed because I ended up having an MrCP scan which successfully detected them. They’re fairly small and it would appear they haven’t been there for a long time but they’ve caused me so much pain throughout this past year that it’s just unbelievable. Don’t get me wrong - I CAN eat and actually do indulge in dairy and fat, except I have to do it throughout the day instead of just in one go. I can have chocolate, pizza, sweets, crisps and cheese but I really do have to spread it out and drinking enough water is also a must in terms of preventing attacks. Due to the situation with the NHS, I’ve chosen to have surgery done privately because I simply don’t want to wait anymore. I know I could but I’m just so eager to return to normal and go back to having larger meals instead of eating “little and often”. Certainly I can have the equivalent of a large meal or actually two large meals a day but it really is tedious. There’s times when I’ve had meals on the larger side in one go and probably 60% of them will result in attacks...so yeah I’m lucky sometimes but it’s incredibly painful when these attacks do strike. What I would really like to know is whether you can fully return to normal eating after gallbladder removal and well, even overindulge a little? Like can you actually have a whole pizza in one sitting without having ANY pain after? I can eat a whole pizza in a day at the moment, but not in an hour like I’d like to! I’m not really looking for any information regarding the operative side of things as I know what to expect there - I know there will be some pain initially and that I can’t go crazy on the first day of recovery, but surely some weeks after that I can eat what I want and however much I want? I mean if gallstones in the gallbladder are the problem, I don’t see why anyone would get pain...at least not THAT kind of pain. I’m hoping that because I’ve had it quite easy with a lot of my symptoms in terms of the lack of nausea and never getting any other complications, I will recover quickly. I also don’t have any other diagnoses’ and definitely no other abdominal issues beside this one!