I’m a bit too high to write this but it’s Sunday and that means it’s time for the weekly wrap-up, come hell or high-water or hellacious surgery. I’ll have the whole story for you next week when I’m slightly less pathetic, but for right now let’s just say that my hospital visit ended up being much nastier than expected because my gallbladder tried to kill me and almost succeeded. I’m home from the hospital for now but I have tubes stuck in my stomach and they hurt like…well…like fucking tubes stuck in your stomach, and I’m sick and crappy and full of holes and I’m grossing myself out by looking at the pictures of the zombie-gallbladder the doctor removed. And the cats think it’s very funny to paw at the tubes that are connected to the inside of my body. I’m like NEO after he woke up in the Matrix, but with cats to fuck with all of your ports.
In all, it’s been a very shitty week and although I’m happy we all survived (minus my murderous gallbladder) I’m eager to get this week behind me. Mostly because (during my drug-addled recovery) I kept insisting to Victor that we needed to track down and clothe jungle animals and give them pockets to put their things in because they don’t have any purses.
This still makes perfect sense to me.
It might be time to cut back on the painkillers.
*******
And in entirely unrelated news, it’s time for the weekly wrap up:
What you missed in my shop (tentatively called “Eight pounds of uncut cocaine” so that your credit card bill will be more interesting.):
What you missed on the internets:
This week on shit-I-didn’t-come-up-with-but-wish-I-did-because-it’s-kind-of-awesome:
- I have no idea. I woke up from surgery to find a bunch of news headlines that made me sad and so I decided to sleep until the world changes. Then I woke up and it hadn’t changed and so I decided to share this: I’d watch The Weather Channel if this was going on. Also, this frog sounds like a kitten and when it squeaks my cat goes nuts and tries to chew on my monitor.
This week’s wrap-up is sponsored by the wonderific folks at The Devotea USA, where they hand-blend small batches of the teas in Blacksburg Virginia. From the owner and tea blender: “We only sell quality loose leaf blends. ‘Teabags’ are a curse word between myself and the other Devotea blenders. We’re not part of the coffee-versus-tea war, as we are all bi-beverage! We all enjoy both quality coffee and tea, but abhor poor imitations of each.” You should probably check them out.
Stupid gallbladder! But you’re home now, I totally get pockets for critters, and I sincerely hope you feel better soon. Major surgery is, well, major, so it’s going to take time to heal. Be gentle with yourself; you’ve bloody well earned it!
Now I SOOO want to see a remake of The Matrix with cats. Like Laser Cats, but with Andy Samberg as Neo. And Kristen Wiig as Trinity. SOMEONE, MAKE IT HAPPEN. Be well, Jenny!
My gallbladder tried to kill me for 5 years while my gastroenterologist missed all the symptoms (and my family history). A new bellybutton (they cut it to remove your gallbladder) and multiple nasty incisions were worth never experiencing that horrendous back pain & violent nausea again. Wishing you all the best & a fast recovery!
I never liked your gallbladder. Got you got rid of him. Her. It.
Feel better soon! xo
They gave you a souvenir photo of your removed organ?? So it’s like a theme park ride, only with more cutting and drugs. I smell a moneymaking idea.
Feel better soon! I had my gall bladder removed several years ago, and believe it or not, rocking in a rocking chair helps!
JUST found out I have gallstones. A few attacks last week ended in a trip to the ER finally. I have a bunch of different pain meds & an appointment with a surgeon in 2 weeks. In the meantime, watching what I eat even more ( blah. Had already cut back so much this year. WTF, gallballder!!!)
Here’s to a speedy recovery for you.
Happy to hear the surgery is over and you’re in the recovery zone. When I woke up from a surgery I had bruises on my arm and had to ask the doctor what they were from. She said it was where they strapped my arm down to inject the anesthesia. Apparently most people are out by the count of three, but I fought hard until seven. The bruises happened when I tried to sit up on the table. She said I looked like a TRex trying to attack. At least I was entertaining to my doctors.
I can relate to this. When I had my gall bladder removed I woke up in the recovery room by sitting bolt upright and screaming. When the anesthesiologist asked me to describe the pain I was experiencing I told her it felt like some fucker had stabbed me 4 times. She and the nurse both had to walk away and come back to my bed. :o) Then we discovered that I have no relief from pain when on Vicodin, Percocet or Morphine. Fun day, I tell ya.
So glad you came through Jenny. Hang in. This too shall pass. Like a freakin’ kidney stone, but it’ll pass.
At one point they though my gallbladder was the culprit for my stomach pain, but then it turns out it wasn’t and then they told me just keep taking expensive ass Prilosec and hope that whatever it was went away on it’s own. Ha ha quality medical care up in here.
I hope your tubes are out soon! Pain, as you are well aware, is bullshit.
Glad to hear it’s over- feel better! PS: Totally give those animals pockets. It’s what they’ve been wanting all along.
Glad you’re on the way to getting better.
I was going to write about how maybe jungle animals don’t have purses but that elephants have trunks, and therefore there is an obvious solution in asking the elephants to carry the jungle creature’s stuff, but then I reckoned that it would be way easier to give them pockets after all.
Major surgery, General anaesthetic, Private hell. Wishing you an Admiral recovery, you crazy beautiful person.
xx
Oh my goodness-you poor thing. I hope they gave you some decent painkillers for this. So..Victor won’t grace up with pictures of all your tubes? Nah..don’t think I wanna see that. I’ll raise a toast to you tonight when I try my first Pimms fruit cup. Tell the cats to stop being assholes & leave your tubes alone!
I’m kind of jealous that I just have a boring gallbladder story and you got a truly murderous one. PLUS they sent you home with poison tube cat toys! Feel better and I really hope you’ll share the pic of your zombie-gallbladder.
Hope you feel better quickly. Thinking of you!
I’m recovering from jaw surgery and my nurses tell me that when I woke up I kept touching my nose and asking “what is this?”
As for your request to Victor…I think you are channeling one of my favorite children’s stories…Katy No-Pocket
http://www.amazon.com/books/dp/0395137179
Wishing you well in healing.
Hope you feel better soon!
Your gallbladder sounds like a real asshole. Good riddance. Sorry for the pain and the news in the world this week. Try sleeping for another week, see if things improve.
As we say our corner of the universe, “Refuah Shlema!” Speedy recovery! You’re the second person this month with a homicidal gall bladder. It’s gotta be all the GM foods and Monsanto Roundup we’re all ingesting. Our GBs weren’t designed to deal with that much sneaky poison.
Feel better…bat the cats….and let Saint Victor coddle you!’
When I was recovering from gall bladder surgery, I bought a pair of purple suede boots that a stilt walker would have been afraid to wear.
Clothing jungle animals makes perfect sense to me,I used to cry when I lived in Nebraska because I thought the cows were cold on the farms when it snowed.Sounds like a childs worry HUH? nope I was 38 someone told me that they were warm because they had leather on That made me sadder ever wear leather in the snow? Not warm at all and it ruins.:(
I can’t believe you had to one up me on your gall bladder, and have it go gangrene. I had 2 stays over 8 days with infectious complications.. but no gangrene. Really hope you’re feeling better soon, and the cats don’t try to use your tubes like straws!
‘Bummer’
My dads gall bladder tried to kill him for almost 18 years before the doctors figured out what it was. It nearly succeeded on the day of my son’s birth, then at least 5 times after that. In March, he finally had it removed. It took 3 surgeries because (a) rural hospitals are ridiculous (b) his body apparently has a funky layout inside (c) even state of the art teaching hospitals can be confused by funky interior design. He had 6 air bubbles get into his arteries. They traveled thru his heart. But here’s the amazing part…he has an arythmia so tho the doctors could do nothing, when his heart stopped, it took care of itself & rebooted on its own! He’s doing much better now. Rest and get better. And start making those pockets. Cause animals totally need them.
The Sharknado is a recurring nightmare of mine. I can’t believe that they pulled those images out of my head so that they could waste alot of money.
Now..Matrix with cats…sounds like a great movie!
(sucks about the added holes to your body. I want to say something funny or inspiring but I got nothing. Eat ice cream).
NEO knows what’s up.
http://m.memegenerator.co/instance/39700253
Wishing you a speedy recovery!! I’m sorry your gall bladder tried to kill you. They are sneaky bastards!
I am so sorry your surgery was more complicated than expected – all my friends bounced right back after (“I only took pain meds for 3 days”; “I was back at work in a couple days”; “I ate everything I wanted right away and had no problems”) and while I didn’t begrudge them their easy experiences, mine sucked for the first month. I was in a lot of pain and takings scrip meds for the entire two weeks, less the last two days. I was in no shape to go back to my (relatively) sedentary job right away. I had to apply for short term disability at work (b/c I missed more than 5 days) and the disability adjuster sad things like “was it the big surgery, with the knife or was it laproscopic where it’s just two little holes?” (I said “actually it was four incisions, two not that small, and they did take a whole organ out of my body so there’s that”). Eventually they gave way and it was fine, but ugh. I then had two weeks of adjusting to having no appetite, feeling like everything I ate got stuck in my throat, freaking out because my heartburn made me think I was having trouble breathing and then having the inevitable “adjustment period” of being w/o the GB – i.e., digestive icks. BUT BUT BUT! And this was my aim here – it did get better. My doctors finally told me “oh yeah, all those things are normal and they will clear up don’t worry” (WOULD HAVE BEEN NICE TO KNOW AHEAD OF TIME YEESH). And they did. Now I am attack free, back to a (mostly) normalish diet, and so glad I had the surgery.
Be kind to yourself and your body, give it time to heal even when you get impatient with the tubes and the pain and that it won’t heal IMMEDIATELY even if you really get mad and tell it to snap out of it. Not that I did that. *whistles, looks away innocently*. it WILL get better, I promise you. I’ve been there, and i know it will. if I was there and we weren’t complete strangers I would give you a hug that missed all your tubes because that would surely hurt.
Congrats on a successful surgery! Good riddance to gall bladder (hereafter referred to as Voldemort or Brett Favre which is really funny if you’re a Packers fan or fan of football I swear but also realize this ain’t the right audience)!
Feel better – and watch Sharknado because it is awful and good and so awful it’s good.
It might hurt to laugh though.
Feel better lady!
Ugh, I am SO sorry that yours was complicated. 🙁 Well, on the bright side, when they pull the tubes out…I’m sure there are literally MILLIONS of ideas that you can find on Pinterest, for what to do with them?
How about fanny packs…in animal prints?
I
And just think of all of the brilliant stories you’ll be able to tell people about how you got your scars. I vote that at least one of them should be from a monkey gang war knife fight.
I said the exact same thing about my gallbladder surgery. I always say, that must be what it feels like to be stabbed! Horrible! But you will feel better after it heals.
I tell people I lost a knife fight with a doctor when they ask about the lovely 5-inch scar across my belly after my own gallbladder surgery. All I get are blank stares and “Why would a doctor be in a knife fight??” (No one ever asks “Why would *you* be in a knife fight?” Nope, never.) Hated dealing with those tubes afterwards too! Feel better soon!
I just gave birth and pooped all over the delivery bed. Many times so yeah I understand a shitty week and hope you recover soon! I wanted to share the zombie apocalypse with you. I’m waiting to be released from the hospital and we hear this sound that sounds like vomiting, coughing, sneezing, and zombie groans, in the hallway. Retch retch they go, slowly approaching our door then moving on, coming back…we imagine a zombie pacing the floors. It lasts for probably ten minutes and my husband says with all sincerity, “if that fucking zombie opens that door I’m tackling him with blunt objects”. I call the nurse because they’re taking hours to release me and no one answers for five minutes so we joked they had been turned into zombies as well. I dunno it was pretty fun t but maybe that’s just cause I hadn’t slept for 56 hours.
Hang in there!
Elephant trunks should be for keeping elephant things only.
FeelBetterFeelBetterFeelBetterFeelBetterFeelBetterFeelBetterFeelBetterFeelBetterFeelBetterFeelBetter
FeelBetterFeelBetterFeelBetterFeelBetterFeelBetterFeelBetterFeelBetterFeelBetterFeelBetterFeelBetter
Please feel better soon … we ALL need you back in full form —
PS: “Felonious Gallbladder” would be a Great name for a punk-rock band …
Get better quickly, and have Victor disable all the Buy buttons.
Here’s something that will cheer you up
https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=scotland's+national+animal&oq=scotlands+&aqs=chrome.1.69i57j0j5j0.10264j0&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
My outpatient Gall Bladder Eviction turned into a six-day hospital stay. Evil, evil thing. They had to do an endoscopy and I wasn’t down with that. As a matter of fact, they didn’t sedate me enough, obviously, and I punched the doctor right in the balls when he tried to stick that thing down my throat. In retaliation, he broke my tooth. The next day they drugged me into a near-coma to get ‘er dun.
It does get better. It will suck mighty wang in the meantime. Hope you feel better soon!
I just frantically scrolled all the way to the bottom of this page to find the photo of the zombie gallbladder. And was disappointed. That doesn’t make me strange does it?
Gallbladders are bastards.
Drug fuleled revelations are always fun. My mother still stands by her revelation that she was going upstairs to get the foot booties 8 hours after her total knee replacement. She was trying to prove me wrong at the time in an argument we where not having at the time.
It’s great that you banished the bad gallbladder unfortunately it didn’t go without making a mess on its way out. Hopefully you will be back on your feet soon. It’s been a weird week. I think we’d all like a do over.
Ugh gall bladders. We should just breed them out of the human race.
Guard those ports! Your cats need pockets of their own!
You should have made a “David after the dentist” video after the surgery… But from all appearances you could probably still make one, please do, before they cut the painkiller supply. Hoping for a quick recovery for you!
You probably look like sh*t, feel like crap and are high as a kite or in total pain but I just want you to know that I love you. 😉
You always crack me up…even at your own expense. That’s love, right?
I am reading “Let’s Pretend this never happened.” I love this! I have never laughed so hard in all my life. A woman at the pool asked me just last week what I was reading. She said she had never heard anyone laugh so loud ( of course she never met me) and I told her about your book and she said she was going to buy it. You are welcome for the extra sales.
I also have a blog, http://www.AllBeckysCreations.blogspot.com if you ever think of visiting…. that would be an outrageous honor!
Thanks,
Becky
Fingers crossed for you… Toes too!
“Fanny Packs for Panthers” – in giraffe print!
Glad you’re alive! Please don’t show the picture of your deathbladder. Thanks! Hope you recover quickly and that your cats leave your tubes alone.
Thinking of your pain and bloody glad I don’t have it!
Hoping to see a pic of your innards soon.
Hang tight, Jenny. Sending you support and best wishes for a speedy recovery
You should get them to give you back your gallbladder in a jar of formaldehyde and leave it on display as a warning to all your other organs not to frak with you.
My uterus totally tried to kill me a few years ago. I had that bitch and all of her friends removed. Never trust an organ you can live without. Blessed be in your recovery.
One more thing: I told my surgeon I was telling everyone who asked that I got the scar on my belly button from getting a naval ring ripped out in a bar fight. He approves.
navel. Stoopy autocorrect.
My gallbladder tried to kill me by sending a stone of kryptonite to block my liver and send it into shutdown. What did your gallbladder do?
I am glad you are doing ok. Maybe you could be more considerate and tie some shiny tassels dipped in catnip to your tubes. Also doubles as sexy temptress belly dancer body art.
Fking gallbladders.
{{Jen}}
I remember the tubes. You will feel so much better, very, very soon. Promise. Very cool that you got a photo of the little prick!
Ah I’ve missed you. So sorry the surgery went poorly. Doctors are great and all but still human. Remind me to tell you about the time I went in for major surgery in my mouth and throat and they accidentally cut my eye and blinded me for about a week. Hope you start feeling better very very soon.
OR…TO GIVE THOSE CLOTHE ANIMALS PURSES…JUST SAYING…
Hope you feel better soon Jenny. (When I was a kid, after my first trip to the zoo, I drew pictures of all the big cats with cross-body purses. Because animals do need pockets!)
That bladder has some gall! Sorry…am I weird for wanting to see the pictures?
My bulldog, Wonderbutt, flipped out over that frog video!!! I hope you feel better soon (but don’t tell anyone you feel better, so you can milk as much sympathy as possible.)
Glad you are on the mend. Sending good wishes for a speedy recovery your way.
Feel better soon. Had my gallbladder out in 02. Nasty bugger when it goes bad.
Glad you are home and the surgery part is over. I hope you are feeling much better very soon. You are amazing to even get on here and write something… dedication.
Glad you’re on the mend! Rest up, enjoy the drugs (mmm, drugs), and please accept, in lieu of a personal-space-invading, I-acknowledge-that-I-don’t-actually-know-you, it-would-probably-unintentionally-freak-you-out bear hug, this friendly high five. 🙂
All gallbladders should DIE! Hope you’re better soon!
I hope you feel better soon & that your cats cut you a little slack. Mine always leave me alone when I throw some of the kids art supplies on the floor.
You sound like you need a dose of Sharknado
I wish you a speedy recovery! And the memory capacity to remember all the weird stuff you insist is real as you come off the meds.
Well just think, if Neo needs an extra you’re all set!
Get well soon!
Great to hear from you and know your recovering. In a not weird or stalker way I have wondered all week how it went. Hope your full recovery is quick. And that is one cute ass frog!
Oh, sweetie…while I haven’t had gall bladder surgery, I have had various parts of my body try to kill me (my colon multiple times, my lungs at least once, my appendix), and am not a stranger to surgery, so while I haven’t needed tubes hanging out of me (an IV was apparently sufficient), I can definitely sympathize.
Some things they may or may not tell you about regarding major surgery:
(1) Being put under general anesthesia at all, for any length of time, is a serious shock to your system; being cut into and having your internal organs juggled as well just ups the ante. I’ve heard it suggested that, for every hour you’re under anesthesia, you should figure on it taking a month to really start feeling like yourself again; while I think that may be overstating it somewhat, it is true that, between having the whole gallbladder problem to begin with, and the surgery that’s resolved it, it’s going to be a while before you’re really up to snuff. Anesthesia in particular can definitely do a number on your mentally; don’t be at all surprised if, at some point over the next week or so, you find yourself semi-randomly bursting into tears for what seems like no good reason, because that’s very common.
(2) Opiates can also be, um, entertaining in terms of what they can do to your psyche…I distinctly remember being in the hospital two days after my colon surgery, bashing the hell out of the PCA (patient-controlled analgesia) button for morphine, and being completely stoned out of my mind. I found myself lying in my hospital bed at 8 a.m. with the TV on, remote in one hand, probably drooling slightly, and watching Teletubbies…”oh, wow, this is really kind of cute!” I thought in my drugged -up state. “Why don’t I watch this more often?” Meanwhile, the 5% or so of my brain that was still actually functioning and present was basically standing there wearing a leather jacket, arms folded, shaking its head, and mutter to itself, “Dude, this is FUCKED UP…” So, yeah, wanting animals to have clothes with pockets? I’m so all over that with you…
Hang in there, try to rest as much as you can, get Victor and Hailey to step and fetch for you, and remember that you’ve got a whole lot of people out here in the ether sending good thoughts and prayers your way, OK? It can’t hurt your recovery at all to be the beneficiary of prayer, and it may even help…
I’m impressed. I was so drugged up after surgery it took me two weeks to figure out how to use my laptop.
Which was probably a good thing. Only because I was so drugged up I was also going to sell my gall bladder on Ebay.
*gentle hugs* I am very sorry to hear that your gall-bladder tried to kill you. I’m very pleased it didn’t manage it. And the Matrix would have been even better with more cats.
Sending you healing thought and beams. Can’t hurt, right?
Actually, my GP told me it generally takes a year after any kind of surgery before you feel completely back to your own “normal” self. But it’s a process.
Sorry your gallbladder tried to kill you. Mine was getting there when they finally got to it, but I didn’t need tubes coming out of my stomach. Not even when my appendix tried to kill me and nearly succeeded. So I have all the sympathy and empathy in the world for you! I hope you get the tubes out soon so you can continue healing. And find some way to distract the cats from your tubes, like throwing food on the floor or something.
And watch Sharknado when you can. It’s AWESOME!
Did they let you keep it? I heard they don’t let you keep removed organs anymore.
Hope you get to feeling better. Gall bladders suck, and sorry you ended up with tubes. Hope the necrotic gall bladder situation keeps improving!
Hey no fair! I didn’t get any pain killers when I had my gall bladder removed. There was pain but it wasn’t unbearable and wasn’t bad enough for the good stuff. It felt like I was just punched in the stomach, not stabbed. Hell I wasn’t even given antibiotics.
holy shit… played the frog video- my kittens came running from elsewhere in my apt. what the hell?
i agree… jungle animals need pockets.
Omg, the frog thing made my dog go insane too! She was snoozing on the couch…her head popped up and she did the adorable head tilt thing. Then she hopped up and stared sniffing around me and tried to eat my phone! Crazy cute.
jungle animals need pockets! where else can they put their cell phones??? am I high? that desert frog is kinda like a cross between a cute kitty and a really ugly horned toad……so, I love it! hope you get better soon!
*hugs* Feel better soon.
Recover soon, surgery is no fun. Thanks for the frog video though, I just woke 3 cats from a sound sleep in another room, they raced out to see what I was torturing. I am going to use that in retaliation after the next all night cat rodeo they hold. Every couple of weeks they seem to hold an all nighter that wakes me up every 1/2 hour. Then they sleep all day peacefully while I stumble around half asleep. ( cue sinister laughter)
Feel better sooooon. But totally work it to get Victor to get you stuff he would ordinarily disallow. Like a (responsibly) stuffed monkey riding a turtle. Which I think is also from the Matrix? I could be wrong though.
Seriously, please take good care of yourself. You rock.
Pockets make more sense than purses. Bag straps would snag on the trees.
You always make sense to me. A weird kind of sense perhaps, but sense.
it’s just as well you got it out, it’s only tupperware for bile anyway.
incredibly painful however, i do have that memory =/
and i agree that animals need pockets =)
happy healing!
Feel better soon! And arm yourself with something to convince the cats to stay away. When I had surgery on my foot and had metal that was inserted into the bone sticking out of it, my idiot golden retriever kept trying to love on me and would bang into it. Thus, the family name for my crutches, “dogwhackers,” was born! So arm yourself, it works! 🙂
I don’t have anything funny to say, but I do hope you feel better soon!
That frog video must be some kind of Batsignal for animals – my dog, who never comes when called and ignores all other sound (I have repeatedly had his hearing checked), came racing into the room when I played it. I wonder what the frog is saying that gets all the other animals excited? Maybe they’re plotting to overthrow the human race and it’s the call-to-arms?
I wasn’t going to add anything here, cause my gallbladder is a memory I hate to be reminded of. But I had over 200 stones, my eyes turned yellow, I spent a week in the hospital, and still went home with tubes. So, yeah, I totally sympathize, Jenny! It hurt SO bad. And wait’ll the dumping syndrome kicks in (insert sad, sad little face here). I hope they told you about that part…
Hang in there Jenny! While the surgery is always a challenge (and it sounds like yours was complicated by the bad condition of your GB), it will improve, and, according to my friends who have theirs out, the end result is a much better quality of life!
Also, Hang in there Victor! it is amazingly difficult when one’s loved one is suffering with a problem that you cannot fix! That is stressful and tends to make all of life suck.
So…prayers for strength for both of you, and, a quick return to good health to Jenny!
Just keep swimming! Your gallbladder is gone, your poop is a fabulous shade of green and your drains will come out soon enough. I hope you have a speedy recovery!
I, too, had a murderous gallbladder. I wish you a speedy recovery.
Also, even though it hurts, it helps to go for a short walk every day, just to move around. I did laps on my driveway. Good luck.
So glad you are back, and so sorry everything is so crappy right now. Feel better soon!
Hang in there, honey. Even drugged up and post-surgery you still have a gift for vivid imagery. (Neo, with cats poking at his tubes. If I’d been drinking milk it would have come out my nose I laughed so hard.) Get well soon.
Get well soon! Maybe your kitties’ bothering of your tubes has a subtle healing effect… I chose to believe this is true.
So glad to hear you are doing better. I just discovered you a few weeks ago and love your writing style. I had to scour Youtube and watch everything that had you reading or being interviewed.
I was thinking it would be very cool to have you for a neighbor. Then I thought, it would probably just make your anxieties worse with me wanting to hang out.
Then I thought, maybe it wouldn’t be so stressful on you if our conversations were held while you were safe inside a fort made from a blanket and a table? 😛
Here’s to wishing you a speedy, pain free recovery.
Maybe the jungle animals can put their things in your gallbladder. You’re not using it anymore. Time to pay it forward.
LMAO, the frog video is the best thing ever. My cat, much as yours, went all freaked out and tried to find the frog. Under the laptop. Which was sitting on my lap at the time.
Hey, sorry to hear that this went poorly. My wife has been flirting with this for years. Hope you recover quickly. And, for what it’s worth, I totally agree about the animals.
Surgery is a pain in the ass, even if it’s a pain in the gallbladder. Probably should just ride out the painpill haze. You don’t want to know what the cats playing with the ports feels like unmedicated. *shudder*
But how was the hospital food, mine was pretty shite! Get better soon those animals need pockets and purses
The purse idea is genius! It’s very proactive. After all, when animals realize that they need purses, I’m sure they’ll do what we did initially– which is catch a slow animals and use it’s skin. And since we have got to be the slowest animals out there… it’s only a matter of time before cheetas are walking around with people-skinned purses. With your method, we can introduce them to the joys of polyester and save millions of lives! Millions!
I hope you continue to feel better until you’re like shiny brand newness!
The good thing about Australian animals is that they mostly all have pockets already. I’d make some comment here about general advanced nature of Australian evolution but I’d be making it up
Get well soon – gall bladder’s suck.
@missdi_k xxx
Five years later I still remember waking up from the pain of an emergency c-section, so to a limited degree I can relate. I presume having some rebellious thing attached to you cut from your body is never fun, and I so hope you recover quickly. 🙂
I was waiting to see if you posted a weekly wrap up. If you didn’t I was gonna be really worried. I hope the worst is over and that you feel better with each day. Also that tiny little desert frog is the cutest thing I’ve seen all week.
🙂
so, Zombie gall bladders and matrix kitties.. sounds like an eventful week.
Glad you’re home and on the mend. here’s to you kicking zombie butt!
ps, i totally can see animals in overalls with pockets for their stuff..
Gallbladders are evil!! And also, why don’t animals have pockets? Kangaroos have a pouch and they totally make that look rock!!
Sorry to hear it’s been so rough. Thank you for letting us all know you’re doing okay, if though you’re being pawed at, and not in a good way.
You’ve been through so much, and you’ll get through this too. We’re all thinking of and praying for you.
My dog (Cosmo The Wonder Dog) also went apeshit at the sound of that frog. He’s still searching the room for the culprit.
Above commenter, owner of Wonderbutt – you have the Gift of Naming. Congratulations.
Get well soon, Jenny!
I’m sorry to read you feel like the TARDIS after last season’s Doctor Who finale, Jenny, but I’m relieved to read of your survival.
I’d hate to see you shuffle off this mortal coil, only to be stuffed and placed in a corner of your house for Victor and his new girlfriend to stare at until it became too awkward and they decided to put you in the basement or attic for squirrels or rats to defile.
I’d hate to see that happen.
I hope you feel better soon, Jenny! I’m planning to have a doctor remove all of my vestigial organs in one go just as soon as I can find one who will do it. I just know my appendix and gallbladder are quietly conspiring to cause my very painful demise. Sending you lots of love and feel better thoughts. Eat some potato soup!
I feel your pain. I had my gallbladder removed in 2001 after being forced to keep it for several months because I was pregnant. An outpatient surgery turned into a week-long hospital stay from hell. I became so ill and full of infection, I swelled up really bad (like Sumo wrestler shit, like how people swell when their organs fail right before death), I had to have a blood transfusion. I was jaundiced really bad, with a high heart rate and blood pressure, everything was off the charts.
I never did find out what went wrong, but I will say this. I haven’t been the same since. I have to be so careful of what I eat now.
I am happy that the surgery went well and I hope you feel better soon.
Feel better soon!
Maybe hold off on the purses/pockets for wildlife until you’ve successfully altered the human DNA so that all our organs are held together with Velcro (or maybe little Lego-based connectors?), so that the surgery they have to perform on you after you start outfitting the jungle animals will be easier to recover from. Wild animals can be so tetchy, you know.
I’ve had my mom come over once when I was bedridden with a bad back. We don’t get along in close quarters, so the fact that I agreed, without hesitation, to her half-sarcastic, “Well if you’re in THAT much pain maybe I should come stay at your house for a few days to help you feel better quicker,” really threw her for a loop. (When I said, “Yeah, I was going to ask if you would,” her response was a stunned and slightly dismayed, “..What?! Really??”)
I hope you get along better with your mother than I do mine, and that you’re feeling something like your usual self soon. (And as others have said, general anesthesia can really do a number on you, so keep all your doctors in the loop and don’t hesitate to call for backup.) xoxo
btw..I found the recovery from gall bladder surgery to be an up and down thing…give it 4 days and it’s tolerable..in the mean time…pain killers are your friend..
@Gweydolyn #118: When you find a doctor who’ll do it, let me know his/her name? I am keeping a list of all the bits and pieces I want to just go ahead and get rid of.
What, we’re not good enough to see the picture?! FINE! I hope you feel better soon. Love ya!
What? NO pictures of the tubes sticking out of your stomach & Ferris playing with them?
Welcome home!
Wow!!! That is a really nasty gallbladder! Good riddance. Now you can start a new line of taxidermied animal purses.
Hope recovery goes well and can’t wait to read all about it! Take care
Glad to hear you’re going to be okay. Can’t wait to see what kind of cards you come up with to go with the gallbladder picture!
This makes perfect sense…in fact, I’m pretty sure that’s why God threw in marsupials at the last minute. “Crap! forgot about pockets!”
Feel better soon.
Me: This is an awesome name for a tea company. ::spells it::
My fiance: I’ve heard of them.
Me: Oh. They sponsored The Bloggess’ weekly roundup this week.
My fiance: I thought you were going to say they sponsored her gallbladder surgery. “Jenny Lawson’s gallbladder brought to you by Devotea!”
I tell you, there is no pain like organ pain. When your organs turn against you… well, you have to turn against them. You don’t have a choice! They have got to go! Speaking as someone with a murderous appendix and treacherous kidneys, I hope you have a speedy road to recovery.
“It was GREEN!”
“…seriously?”
“Okay, it wasn’t, but it was NASTY!!! And DISGUSTING!!!”
“Um, dude? It was one of your wife’s internal organs. It was NEVER going to not be disgusting.”
“BUT IT HAD PUS!!!”
My buddy? Who also enjoyed the dubious pleasures of a gangrenous gallbladder? Thinks that you need to swap spouses.
BE WELL, WONDERFUL GIRL!!!! 🙂
I couldn’t understand why they didn’t do your surgery when you first went to the hospital. I’m so sorry it turned into a nightmare. When my gallbladder tried to kill me, they caught it early enough that I just had surgery the next day and then stayed in the hospital 1 more day to get pumped full of antibiotics. On a side note, that’s when I found out I was allergic to latex and the adhesive in surgical tape… good times! Fell better soon girlie!
In case you haven’t seen this yet – awesome song by Amanda Palmer
http://www.addictinginfo.org/2013/07/14/tabloid-posts-misogynistic-review-of-musician-amanda-palmer-artist-replies-in-song/
Man, Devotea is an awful name. Devotees are sexually attracted to disability, I’ve had my fair share of weirdos coming on to me simply because I”m disabled.
But that’s not as bad as *someone* mistaking a bat’s tail for an erection 😉
Feel better soon!
Aha…’and on the eighth day god was all messed up from gallbladder surgery and created kangaroos and assorted marsupials and said ’twas good’.
What an awful week for you! And yet, in the midst of all that pain, you were still kind enough to think of the needs of animals without pockets! Hope you’re feeling better soon!
Wishing you a swift recovery!
Glad you survived surgery! I totally agree with you that animals need clothes with pockets since they don’t have purses. How else *will* they carry all their stuff around? Sad thing is, I’m completely not medicated right now. Not really sure how I’m allowed to walk around among normal people. 🙂
“Absolutely, I got stabbed you know, right here.” – Captain Mal
I don’t know if you’ve seen this: Nathan Fillion photobombs himself. http://youtu.be/RmU-Bmk4Wrk
Sometimes you just have to let go of what’s not working for your. Or your gallbladder when it decides to be a bad-ass. (Because nobody wants a bad-ass gallbladder in their life.)
I am so insanely glad to hear that you’re okay. Even if disturbed by asshole cats who want to fvck with your poison tubes. Seriously cats. They’re poison. Let it go.
Hugs to you, Victor, and Haley, and you take as much goddamn time as you need. I’ll dance around my house to Blurred Lines by Robin Thicke and Get Lucky by Daft Punk in the meantime because they both have Pharrell Williams in them. And I’ll dedicate my crazy dancing to you. Because it would totally make you laugh. As long as laughing didn’t hurt too much.
Love you, and take care. <3
Feel better, dear. And enjoy those pain pills while they last. 🙂
Hey Jenny,
I know you’re in all kinds of pains and stuffs, but I’m going to take a risk, and write to you. I recently discovered your blog, devoured your book, (shortly after I realized how fanfuckingtastic you are!) (laughed, and cried) Should I have used hash tags there, instead of parenthesis?? #nooneactuallyknows. Regardless, I feel like I should clutch your blog to me as a security blanket. …not to protect me, but to make me feel completely like I have a close girlfriend that gets me, completely. I suffer from severe anxiety disorder, and I’m just coming to terms with it, and my husband upon marrying me thought he was getting a crazy person…he just didn’t realize HOW crazy. Anyway, you make me feel like I make sense. It’s sometimes rare. So…just…thank you.
I’m so totally fucking jealous you have pics! I never got to see my murderous appendix or homicidal hunk of lung blebs. I actually asked for each in a jar. Assholes looked at me like I was cray-cray. I know you can relate.
Hope you’re up to speed soon and great pins…as always.
You were stabbed once before, with chicken! Feel better very soon, Jenny.
Aren’t you the one usually feeling stabby? Get well soon. How can we help?
I’m glad your gall bladder’s plot was thwarted.
I’m very grateful that you’re okay.
That is all.
I’m really sorry that your surgery ended up being so complicated, but hey – look at it this way: your gangrenous gallbladder totally beats my “You had an extra artery that wasn’t supposed to be there, and when we clipped it it wouldn’t stop bleeding” reason for staying longer in the hospital after our respective cholecystectomies (I totally had to look that up, by the way…)
You got pictures of your gallbladder? My doctors never took any (despite thanking me for “an interesting surgery”). Now I’m jealous. But my gallbladder apparently “fell apart like a spilled purse” (poetic lot, surgeons) so maybe there wasn’t much to photograph. And they wouldn’t let me have a gallstone because it would be a biohazard. What a gyp.
Life is much better without a gallbladder. After the tubes are out, it’s a great thing.
I’m sorry about your gallbladder becoming an assassin. And I’m sorry the world sucks (it really, really does right now).
But your jungle animals with pockets made me think of “Katy No-Pocket”, which was one of my favorite books growing up, so thanks for that!
Heal well, feel better- the world needs you kickin’ around!
Are those the Jackson-(was a BigAss) Pratt drains? with the bulb for sucking ooze out of your body? I had one after my gb surgery and it was such a pain in the side. It’s pretty odd sensation when they take it out – not painful, just weird. I’d never had a tube pulled out of the side of my body before, so there was nothing to compare it to. I was awfully glad when it was gone, though. Hang tight – you’ll feel more normal in a few more days.
BTW – I’m having a biopsy tomorrow (my uterus is being very naughty) and would appreciate a kind thought or two.
I had 3 tubes/drains after my double mastectomy. I REALLY hope you don’t heal TOTHEM cause that shit hurts like you can’t believe when they pull them out. I suggest taking extra pain meds before removal to be safe.
My yorkie LOVES the little squeeky frog! Haven’t tried it on the cat yet
Feel better soon dear!
This only further supports my theory that cats think we exist solely to pose as furniture or play toy. Feel better soon.
In reading the weekly wrap up I totally read the tea sponsor’s location as “Blacksburg Vagina” at first glance which didn’t surprise me in the least because well, it’s you and also I may have had a beer or two beforehand but either way it got me to read it a couple of times through SO mission accomplished “The Devotea USA”!
I went through the gall bladder surgery 6 years and found out my doctors lied to me about my food choices. It changes forever, and I wrote up a short instructional here: https://galltalk.wordpress.com/diet-101/
Hope it helps!
When I told Mr Spouse and my family about Sharknado! and how sad I was to have missed it, they all had the same response…. “OMG, what did Jenny say about it???” I said I didn’t know, but I thought you were too busy bringing attempted murder charges against a body part to have been monitoring Twitter. They all agreed it was very sad and have promised to find a way I can watch the replay of Sharknado in your honor. (I’m still a little put-off that they were more worried about what you thought about it than my having missed the most awesome disaster movie EVER… but that’s what happens when I introduce them to people who are funnier than I am!)
Jesus, woman. Thank goodness you survived, for real, we’re all depending on you to stay alive and well so you can keep entertaining us. <3
When they gave me pain meds during childbirth I full-on hallucinated that water was dripping from the ceiling right into my jugular vein. (Among other things…) CRAY-CRAY.
Even when in pain and high on drugs, you still worry about the jungle animals and their lack of pockets. That is very admirable. Take care of yourself.
After I had my gallbladder out I refused to talk in the recovery room, even to my husband. It took a while but they finally figured out that I was convinced they had given me a tracheotomy for some reason. I think i fell asleep before they actually got me to believe that they hadn’t. I’m sorry your surgery had extra bad stuff but at least its out and you have an excuse to skip out on any chores you dislike doing. I strung mine out for almost a month, I’m sure you can get quite a bit more use out of your ordeal. lots of love!!!
I hope you feel better soon, Jenny. XO.
For you, because laughter is the best medicine (at least, the best that isn’t a controlled narcotic.) To the tune of Feeling Groovy. Feel better soon!
Feeling Stabby (The 59th power struggle/tantrum song.)
speed up, you need to move fast, you’ve got to get this moment past
I’m kickin’ a$$, and throwing stones, my patience done and feelin’ stabby
Feeling stabby
G’bye gall bladder, glad you’re goin’, you haven’t been so good for knowin’
Ain’t cha got no meds for me, do-it-do-do, feelin’ stabby
Feeling stabby
I’ve got stuff to do, it’s piled deep
and I’m pissed off and cranky and really need to sleep
as the cats in the house paw all the tubes stuck in me
da da da da, feelin’ stabby
pain meds I love you, you make me less stabby
I’m glad you’re ok. it’s mostly for selfish reasons like the fear of losing a huge source of amusement but i think that still counts.
Glad you are on the mend! Best wishes!
Whoa. My cat totally ran into the room and jumped up on the desk when I played that frog video! Talk about a kitten call.
I hope you are feeling better every day, sweet Bloggess!
Ok, so now I’m waiting for the surgery pics but for the love of God please put a warning on the title so I can make sure I look at them AFTER I eat breakfast. Thanks and hope you feel better soon.
we just saw a preview for that movie on Space channel this morning while watching a movie about a bigfoot the size of godzilla… probably from the same producers as Sharkoctapus and Megacroc.
I can relate after a couple of surgeries myself. I was amazed that there really are sufficient words to convey the level of pain after surgery, other than “PLEASE!”. Feel better soon, hang in there.
May you have a speedy recovery and your murderous gallbladder rot in gallbladder hell!
Hope you get better soon and to stop the cats playing with your tubes remove the mice…
I got my gallbladder removed after a nasty OMG I AM DYING FOR REAL YOU GUYS hospital visit. Hope you feel better soon!
Get well soon! Been there before myself. IT sucks, but once you heal you will feel so much better!
It has definitely been a shitty week to be conscious, anyway.
But I am sorry you’re feeling gross and all post-surgery. It is surprising and somewhat concerning to find that this post is distinctly gallbladder-photo-free, but get well soon!
Holey crapsacks (see what I did there? It was almost like a clever play on words)! I’m really glad you survived because I’ve had enough bad news for one week. Thanks for making my own health trials feel pretty mundane.
Though I have to disagree with Victor on this one – jungle animals really do need pockets.
I hope you feel better real soon. Feeling less than your completely awesome self probably stinks for you. It certainly does for the rest of us…Sending bunches of happy thoughts your way…
I believe we who have survived murderous gallbladders should all get T-shirts afterwards with some sort of really cool saying on it. Like something You could come up with that I can’t because right now I’m dealing with a murderous brain or murderous nerves in my brain but really Galbladders are the most evil organ ever! Mine tried to kill me turned me all yellow cuz it tried to kill my liver and pancreas too! Only plus side of this was that I got to spend a week Ina half in the hospital on a morphine pump before I was well enough for them to remove said murderous galbladder. Those morphine pumps are like a little slice of heaven on earth though they also make you flirt with cute nurses infront of your girlfriend :hangs head: and give your parents directions to the hospital you don’t want them to visit you at!!!!
Then while you are having your murderous galbladder removed your father and mother get to have a great happy reunion with an old friend and tell you all about how awesome it was while you are being weened off morphine!
As for your conversation with Hector. Might want to check your phone too drugs apparently make me randomly text friends and yell at them for killing elder snakes for them and how ungrateful they were and how rude it was that they never thanked me! Also I sent emails about said snake to a friend in England also asked a nurse if they installed giraffes in all the rooms or if they put this one in just for me… She just shot me up with more drugs and knocked me back out. Lesson I learned two weeks ago never trust your friends to tell you to put down your phone when you are high!
Seriously tho I’m glad your mean evil galbladder is gone and you will be back to all better soon!
I’m so glad you got rid of that scheming gallbladder. It was definitely up to no good! You may feel like shit but at least your cats are amused 😉
Feel better soon Jenny!
GALL BLADDERS SUCK!!! Drugs are great.. as for the World it sucks.. no body plays nice… Yes critters do need little vests with pockets to carry their things!! Can you save your tubes for future cat toys????? So glad your home, just wish you were feeling your usual stabby self, your cats Von trapping and perhaps a visit from Beyoncé would be nice!!! FEEL BETTER SOON!!! STAY WITH THE DRUGS!! AWAY FROM THE NEWS and please take a picture of cats playing with tubes to share!
but then the monkeys will be “I mock you with my monkey pants” #BtVS
Crazy gizzards. Hope you heal super fast!!!
Katy-No-Pocket will thank you for your thoughtful consideration. And now we will need more children’s books to accommodate the mass number of animals with pockets you may or may not have created.
Get well soon Bloggess!
You went away then came back relatively immobile with extra dangling bits, of course the cats think you are a new play toy. I hate when I don’t have pockets too. Not only do i love tea, but i was also crafted in Blacksburg, it’s like Devotea and I are related… or something (glad you are ok Jenny, get better soon)
That pockets thing makes PERFECT sense! I know Katie No-Pocket, and believe wholly in her teachings. Also, I hope your Matrix-tubes are out of you in a reasonable amount of time. I mean… yuck.
Get well soon!
Yuck-o. After I had my gall bladder removed, I had to build a protective fort around my belly to keep the stupid cats from climbing on top of me. The fort was made of my arms and several pillows. The fort did its job, but it still sucked, and I didn’t even have any fun tubes or gross things to look at. Feel better soon.
Cats – – > Déjà vu – – > a glitch in the matrix!
[Neo sees a black cat walk by them, and then a similar black cat walk by them just like the first one]
Neo: Whoa. Déjà vu.
[Everyone freezes right in their tracks]
Trinity: What did you just say?
Neo: Nothing. Just had a little déjà vu.
Trinity: What did you see?
Cypher: What happened?
Neo: A black cat went past us, and then another that looked just like it.
Trinity: How much like it? Was it the same cat?
Goodness– hope you feel better soon!!!
I am (perhaps selfishly) really glad you didn’t die. And you got pictures of your mutant gallbladder zombie?? I never get surgery souvenirs.
You’re like the internet now. You’re not a dump truck! You’re like a series of tubes!
I need sleep.
Also, I fully support clothing animals. It was just shitty of nature only to give marsupials and humans access to pockets. Though I guess spiders kind of have pockets, but they only keep eggs in them so it’s kind of like not having pockets at all.
Actually, nature pretty much made all natural pockets a place for offspring. Does that make your vagina (or vaginas in general; I don’t judge) a pocket?
I hope you feel better and get de-tubed soon. I have no idea what a galbladder even does, but surely it’s not suposed to kill you.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!! I’m so sorry, but, I love the way you write and you described your situation perfectly. I cannot be blamed for finding so much humor when you clothed it so beautifully in the body of this post. So sorry you had to go through that experience but extremely glad that you are up and swinging. That is always a good sign!
I like your idea about providing clothing with pockets for the jungle animals. In fact, it just might be THE most charitable idea I’ve heard all week! And of course, next, they’d want teeny-tiny plastic rubbermaid containers to put their stuff in to store it in those pockets. I have a few little containers we could start with for proof of concept. I think it’s brilliant!
(Don’t you wish everything was made like rubbermaid?)
Get well soon, Jenny! 🙂
I’m so sorry you had to go through that! I hope you feel better soon! My best friend went through that same issue, but shes doing great now! So keep your head up!!!
Dear Jenny,
I read your blog regularly and it almost always makes me smile. So I owe you quite a bit for all those smiles. So I’ll tell you that right now, I’m doped up because I rearranged my furniture and the cable box that lights the way to the bathroom wasn’t where it should have been and I landed head first in my own bathtub, breaking my shoulder and bruising my hoo-ha like it’s never even imagined possible! I took the Klonopin that night. I know, stupid Klonipin right? Depression lies is one of my favorite coping techniques and my friends all think I know you because I tell them what you said today like you were at my office.
Feel better
I am so sorry you’ve had a hell of a surgery & hopefully the recovery is quick. I smell a possible lawsuit? In any case, rest, take the drugs, be kind to your battered body & remember that a lot of people are praying for you. Whatever the hell that means in the grand scheme of life. I’m sending positive energy your way.
Eek – if tubes to your stomach hurt as much as tubes to your heart (not some odd sort of metaphor – actual drainage tubes into your heart) then I totally feel your pain as having a tube into my heart was the most painful thing ever – and I’ve knocked myself around a fair bit. Take care!
I’d say “I feel your pain” but the truth is I don’t. I have an idea on how crappy you feel and hope you feel better soon. I didn’t have my gall bladder try to kill me but my Left Kidney decided that it would try to make me want to be dead by sending a stone. It got impacted and I was fine until it decided that it wanted to move the furniture around in my urethra and then I got all the good meds. The stent made me feel as if I had to “go” every 5 minutes.
I am certain that it’s not the same as the tubes being in you. I hope they come out soon and then you can actually try to heal. I didn’t feel better until the stent came out. You may feel better once the tubes are gone and you start to heal. I’m sorry that it happened so close to you anniversary.
When I had to have my belly button hernia fixed I told Rey that I felt like I had been stabbed with a knife and he told me, “Yeah, basically that’s what happened.” and then I was all, “I was stabbed in the pit of my soul!” Because they went in through my belly button and all.
I agree with the cute frog bit-my cat who ignores all sound except shaking treat bags leapt up for it. But I can’t fathom why animals need carry-alls. They are either wild and can just pounce on anything they want or domesticated and have humans tripping over themselves to offer treats and toys should they merely look at us.
Sorry-that sounded really bitchy. Animal accessories would be very cute whether or not they need them. I went back to work teaching grade school a few days after the gall bladder extraction but it still hasn’t changed my rep as being a whiner..
(Invisible diseases like MS are apparently supposed to feel nonexistent to the patient too)
Sharknado! Probably a level 3 out of 5 laughter from flying sharks; thank you for boosting me up! Pacific Rim later – funniest title probably ever – but funny and sad, since it’s only funny if you’ve learned about the title’s sleaziness from porn.
Ok so I checked the Tea Shop. They need to add more color to their site.
It’s Tuesday and if you still have your tubes I bet by now you can think of nothing but having them removed, until you consider what it will feel like to have them removed, which I can tell you is excruciatingly lovely.
and now with less poor spelling!
@Justice- Not sure we have the budget to sponsor surgeries, but that sounds like a brave new world of advertising, makes me think of the people who have gotten tattoo ads
@deafgimp – every group including the kinky ones have their weirdos. I am not too bothered by being a homonym with a kinky group since we mostly do online sales and that should be all typing.
@Vicki Fitch – well I do have one, and Virginia is trying to regulate them so I guess The Devotea USA is sort of from Blacksburg vagina 😉
@JJ – 84thand3rd – tea siblings!
I hope recovery goes well!!!
Never cut back on pain killers 😛
“I’m like NEO after he woke up in the Matrix, but with cats to fuck with all of your ports.”
This is why you’re awesome.