[ music | Depeche Mode – A Pain That I’m Used To ]

So, a couple times in June and once in August I get this near-pain in my upper abdomen. A little research showed that it was in the area of my gall bladder. It wasn’t horrendous pain. I just had to sleep carefully on one side, and it only happened after a couple really cheesy meals, so I assumed it was some kind of indigestion of the fatty cheeses.

Flash forward to last night. About 11:30pm I get the same pain, although it dulls a little. I get a couple hours sleep. The pain returns about 8 in the morning, and I can’t get back to sleep. Still not really bad yet, I waste a couple hours then get ready for work. It’s getting pretty bad now. 1pm rolls around and I feel like I’m being stabbed over and over. This is a little more than I can deal with, so I decide to go to the hospital. Over the next ten minutes it got much much worse, and getting to the hospital on my own is no longer an option. I’m doubled over in agony, pale as death (from what I hear), sweating like a klansman in Harlem, and call 911. By the time the ambulance comes I’m weak, shaking, dizzy, and nauseous as hell. They put me on oxygen and hit the gas to the hospital. I do the technicolor yawn twice during the ten minute ride. We arrive and they start an IV, take blood, give me a wonderful cocktail of painkillers in my IV, and I’m back on Earth.

A few hours and tests later we find out I need my gall bladder removed. I have three gallstones, and they can’t do the ultrasonic crushing like kidney stones. So, I’ll consult with some surgeons, watch my diet, and get it yanked in the next few weeks.

I’d like to take this moment to thank the Republican party for helping make it possible for 44 million Americans to have no health insurance by demonizing every national healthcare initiative as “socialism”, and not raising the minimum wage in over a decade, yet raising their own pay 7 times in the same period. Rock on!