Gall bladder surgery - what's the recovery time?

[thelittlebluepills]

I need to have my gall bladder removed but as I have two youngish children, no family nearby and a disabled husband I need a realistic view on how long it;s going to take me to recover - so I can adequately plan for it all

I am a bit concerned that the medics are quite blase stating it'll be two weeks recovery .... I do hope so...

what is your experience?

I had gall bladder surgery a few months ago. It has a really fast recovery time but you will definitely need some help for at least 3 days, but preferably a week, particularly if either of your children are young enough to still needing carried.

Your tummy will probably be sore for much longer than that, but you should be able to get about at home just fine after a week, if your recovery is anything like mine.

to still need carrying, I mean.

I had mine done last August by keyhole surgery. I stayed in hospital overnight and came home to bed rest for about 3 days, then gradually got back to normal. I went back to work after 4 weeks.

The whole thing was not as bad as I expected and I only needed pain killers for a couple of days.

I am clearly tougher than anyone. I had mine done in 2001 and flew back to Oman three days later. No problems for me and it was such a relief to be free of the pain of pancreatitis.

I'd say 2 - 4 weeks but I didnt feel 100% for a while after that. The hospital told me no driving for at least 2 weeks either.

You need help for a couple of weeks definitely. If not possible, what I would suggest is you give the house a really good clean and tidy and all the washing/ironing done in the days before you go in and try and get DCs and DH to help out keeping it reasonable after that.

Also pre-arrange for internet shopping deliveries and make some meals in the freezer for days when you dont feel like standing cooking - which you wont.

Some things you may also want to prepare for... You probably won't have the best appetite for a few days after the operation, my surgeon suggested no solid food for about a week but I think I started eating properly after about 3-4 days. But make sure you're stocked up on soups just in case. They'll also tell you that you need a low fat diet afterwards, so might be worth getting used to eating properly in advance, etc, so it's not too much to handle (if you don't already ofc).

You'll need to wear loose fitting tops for a little while because of the scars and trousers too if you tend to wear your waistband around your belly button (I had got used to doing that because of my C-section scar).

But I was surprised by how fast the recovery time was as I generally get "struck down" with any minor affliction for longer than everyone else, but even I was going to the supermarket and doing other normal stuff about 3 days after my op. The only thing I couldn't really do was carry my very large and kicky 8mo around.

Thanks for your replies - it went well this morning and the advice from the rather gorgeous registrar concurs with what you have all said (albeit he didn't quite get how physical being a mum is)

op should be in May sometime so low fat and boring food until then!

You are allowed to put a massive piece of stilton cheese in your mouth and chew and spit it out if the craving is too much. Its like smoking without inhaling. Just dont swallow.

Good luck.

BeenBeta lmao, good idea!