Gallbladder pain, attacks, removal, and recovery

Hi My name is Jenn and I just want to put my experience out there to maybe help someone eles who is going thur what I have been thur in the last 5 years. It all started with pain just under my ribcage on the right side. It felt better to hold it or put pressure on it. Not knowing what it was I went to the Dr and had an ultrasound and the dr told me the ultrasound was normal and I had gastrisits and to go on the brat diet.
So time marches on and I continue to have pain and I am nauseous every morning when I wake up with and has progressed into bouts of nausea and vomiting, diarrhea, gas bloating ect. So it starts happening in cycles. I would be good for 3-4 months then have an attack. So the next bad one I had was in may of 2010 I got extremely sick and pucked and dryheaved for 6 hrs constant. I went to the dr the next day and was tested for h. pilori with positive results. The dr put me on antibiotics for an ulcer since my symptoms were ulcer like acording to that dr. So I felt better for a few then had another attack only to be back to the starting point of not knowing if it was my gallbladder and being able to get a dr to listen to me.
So anyway I had the worst attack I had ever had that lasted for 4 days. I had all symptoms from nasuea to vomiting, pain in my back like a knife. no eating i just had water. So I went to a different dr only to have another ultrasound, that again the dr said was normal. So heres the kicker when they called me the with the test results and told me it was normal I asked the nurse on the phone "where do I go from here? is there some other kind of test" To which her response was "well I dont know whats going on with ya hon." She didnt even bother to read my chart before she called me. Amazing the stupidity.

So finally I had a friend come visit me and told me to just call her and she would get me in to see her dr. Shes a nurse for a GI DR. YEAH..!! finally some real help. So my first visit was good he listened to what I had to say and told me it definalty sounded like my gallbladder. So before anything else he ordered an upper endoscopy to rule out ulcers, celiacs, and chrones. all negative, he then ordered a hida scan. a radioactive test to tell them if your gallbladder is working. So the first part is pretty painless. just radio active material being injected it to you. then after your liver has filled up your gallbladder with bile they inject you with a chemical that mimics eating a fatty meal. OMG THAT IS NOT FUN. Threw me right into an attack .. So the results showed my gallbladded ejection fraction was only at a 15%. My nurse friend told me that it would need to come out, at this point it was only getting worse with pain every day no matter what I ate. Green grapes were about the only thing I could eat with out pain. So with 5 years of pain off and on and not really eatting any wheat or pasta went gluten free for a while. I decdied to have it taken out.
Today I am 2 days after Laparoscopic surgery.
ALL RECOVERY IS INDIVIDUAL. I went home the night of my surgery. I only slept for a few hrs, I was up for every 4 hrs taking pain meds. lortab. The pain got away from me and I didnt sleep and was in massive pain the next morning. I called the dr and they told me to start taking 2 at a time to get the pain under control. So now I am feeling like i got hit by a truck. I am still having the co2 gas pains and it is expelling slowley. There is also pain where the puncture wounds are. And try not to cough. It feels like your insides are ripping out. also nomal I called the surgeons office. they said if you have to cough use a pillow against your abs. So with that hopefully I will be feeling better in a few days. and I hope my experience can help someone else who is having the same problems. If anyone has any quesions I will be happy to answer them and help with information in anyway I can.
Jenn.