Gallbladder II - The Gathering Storm (copyrite W Churchill)

So over the last 12 months or so I have been doing the 5-2 diet which for those who have been living at the bottom of a dark pit, is where you eat normally for 5 days a week and have a very restricted, fasting diet on the other two. The idea is that you not only tend to lose weight, but it's also good for your health re blood sugar, cholesterol and all that other malarkey.
I kind of got into the routine of it: not easy but doable for me and I did indeed start to lose some weight - all good stuff.
Then about 8 months ago I started noticing that after a fast day, when I started eating normally, I was getting slightly uncomfortable digestive pains in my side. Didn't know what they were did I, not being the incredibly dull and irritating gallbladder expert that I now am. As I usually had a nice baguette for lunch on my non-fast days, I thought, maybe I was becoming gluten intolerant, rather than just my usual intolerant

Picture of me in one of my more tolerant moods


So what did I do? I gave up all bread and hey presto - felt fine for several months, Of course, I realise now with blinding clarity that what was making me feel fine was not the lack of gluten, but the lack of BUTTER. I love butter, and never stinted myself, and any piece of bread in any form had to be covered in it's own weight in butter before I would contemplate ingestion.



Here's me preparing the butter for a baguette. Hmmm I may need another pack
I mean, my gallbladder must have thought I'd cut my throat, so infrequently was it being used. Still had it's pesky gallstone problem of course, but who cares? it's just sitting back and watching the digestive show from the sidelines.


Then, on Aug 28th came THE HOLIDAY
Gentle reader, if there is ever a wakeup call for the digestive system, it is THE HOLIDAY
So. Up to the holiday, I was eating no bread and (without really realising it) no butter, very little carbohydrate (to maintain low GI and hence blood sugar) very little fat, not much cheese, hardly any meat, quite a bit of fish, including lots of raw salmon (I love sashimi) lots of steamed vegetables, fair amount of fruit. In essence, a pretty damn healthy, low fat, low sugar diet without really realising it


Here's what I had on the first three days of the holiday in Lymington (see Crabs posts)


DAY 1: spaghetti bolognaise, lots of cheese
DAY 2: lunch consisiting of fresh bread AND BUTTER from the market, seafood, cold meats, chutneys, pickles, pork pie was in there somewhere I think, cheese etc. Supper: out for an indian: lamb madras, lots of bhagis, pilau rice etc all swimming in fat
DAY 3: Roasted an enormous 12lb whole shoulder of pork I got in the market and had that for supper with masses of roast potatoes, Yorkshire puddings, roast carrots and parsnips, leeks in white sauce, gravy made with all the pork fat and juices, all the trimmings, little sausages wrapped in bacon, followed by a nice selection of full fat cheeses (and a bit of fruit)
DAY 4: I made Cassoulet with huge chunks of the left over roast pork (with not much fat trimmed off), toulouse sausages, confit duck (duck cooked in goose fat) lots of beans, all cooked in a rich sauce made with the leftover gravy enriched with red wine.
It was stonkingly delicious
DAY 5: had muesli and prunes for breakfast, and felt a little bit iffy in the morning. God help me, I blamed the prunes.
Lunch: a huge pork sandwich (still had masses left over), which I had made with lovely fresh white bread slathered with butter, mayonnaise, chutney, pickled onions, and of course some lettuce to watch my diet.


That afternoon, I suddenly screeched to a halt. If you had put an ear to my digestive system at that point, the conversation would have been along the following lines:
Stomach: CHRIST!! Here it comes again. What did he buy, a whole effing pig? Yo Brain - call the gallbladder AGAIN
Brain: OK, but he's not gonna like it. I mean, he's been working back to back twelve hour shifts, and he keeps grouching about the gallstones blocking his path
Stomach: MAKE THE GODDAM CALL!
Brain: Alright already. Jeez what a crouch. Yo Gallbladder
Gallbladder (exhausted) Don't you dare...I've been firefighting for four days straight and I ain't gonna stand for it no more.
Brain: Sorry matey, but it's more pork...
Gallbladder: WHAT...THE...FUCK... I tell you she's gonna blow...OK, OK, what the hell, I'll give it one more shot. Well here goes nothing. Stand back everyone. One...Two...Three...SQUEEEEEEZE
(there is the sound of a klaxon) NOW HERE THIS...NOW HERE THIS...GALLBLADDER BLOCKED I REPEAT...GALLBLADDER BLOCKED...GALLSTONES EVERYWHERE...IT'S LIKE A GODDAM ROCKSLIDE...


...and I'm deteriorating fast. I have an uncomfortable pain spreading around my middle which gradually gets worse as the afternoon and evening progresses, and I spend one of the most painful and horrible nights of my life with this unremitting pain in my stomach, under my rib cage, up my back. Nothing I can do, no position I adopt makes the slightest difference.


Exhausted, I take myself off to a doctor at 8.00am who hears my story and says instantly, "classic gallbladder. Have you changed your eating habits recently, or eaten anything fatty?"


And for the first time, the word gallbladder enters my consciousness.