Is it my gallbladder?: A little history... - British Liver Trust

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Is it my gallbladder?

Godincontrol profile image
4 Replies

A little history on me. I’ve been a heavy drinker for about 15 years mostly daily. I quit drinking near the beginning of this year and after a couple of weeks of not drinking I began feeling unwell. I lost my appetite and began losing weight and just felt “sick”. Also began having dizziness as well as heart palpitations that are almost constant. The weight loss has leveled off after about 50 lbs. (I was really overweight at around 340 lbs.). Some of the weight loss has been from undigested food in stool, lack of appetite and me cleaning up my eating habits. Blood work on LFTS have seemed fine exept alk phosphate has increased from around 60 to upper 90s over the course of six months. Also initially ggt was 45 but has increased to 67 so not too bad. The things that have been mostly out of whack have been my white blood cell counts going from high normal to around 13,000 as well as platelets going from high normal to slightly elevated over the past 6 months. I’ve had several ct scans and ultrasounds that only commented on an enlarged liver of 20 cm and showing mild fatty liver. The last ultrasound showed two small gallstones and two ultrasounds showed sludge. They performed a fibroscan that was consistent with cirrhosis (median kpa of 16) and followed up with biopsy that showed only mild steatohepatitis grade 1 of 3 with fibrosis 0 of 4. (Worries this biopsy is wrong). A Hida scan showed that my gallbladder ejection fraction was only 9%. The drs have scheduled to remove my gallbladder next week but I’m freaking out because i don’t feel that is the issue. I’ve not had any pain but I have had excrutiating pain over the past several years in my abdomen prior to my feeling ill which was induced by fatty foods. I know no one can diagnose me but I was wondering if anyone had gallbladder issues that did not cause pain and only caused dizziness feeling ill, etc. I’ve also had other symptoms that come on suddenly such as coldness, blood pressure regulation issues, low grade fever, low testosterone issues etc. I’ve also had urinary issues where i retain water while upright but will urinate off extra water when lying down. Weird I know. I’m just freaking out to have the surgery if it’s still something liver related because i know that can push the liver over the edge. I’m also worried what they will find with my liver while in there. I’m terrified that the biopsy was wrong and the fibroscan was right but have been throwing around the idea that this is a mild case of alcoholic hepatitis. Thanks for any comments and please pray for me if I go through this surgery next Tuesday.

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Godincontrol
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4 Replies

Hi

First if all you have done really well abstaining from alcohol. Fatty food is one of the worse things to eat when you have gall stones. I personally would go ahead with gall bladder removal cos it can lead to peritonitis so at least you will have one problem out of the way. I had mine mine out in October 85 when I was 20 , open surgery. I wish you the very best of luck for Tuesday. Take care Lynne

guess1001 profile image
guess1001

All the best for Tuesday. Keeping you in prayers. Jx

Lonelyinthis profile image
Lonelyinthis

Hello! Did you end up getting your gallbladder removed?

Godincontrol profile image
Godincontrol

No I didn’t. It wasn’t my gallbladder and the test showed something wrong. I fought the doctors and even had doctors mad at me for not taking it out. Everything is fine now. They are unsure of what was going wrong but everything corrected after about 7 months so they think it was something viral messing with my system.

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