It's good to be alive

[Destroyer]

So, last Monday morning, around 4am, I started to get pain in my chest under my right rib. I wrote it off as a gas pocket and kept doing what I was doing... but the pain started getting worse and also moved from my right side to the center of my chest (about an inch under where the ribs end). It just stayed there and didn't seem to want to go away like a gas pocket normally would.
Finally, after putting up with it until about 11 Am I decided that it was time to get it checked out, so off to the local hospital ER went I for some evaluation. Well, after testing me with an EKG and other tests the verdict came back that it was not a heart attack. However, after a CT (CAT) scan and some other tests it looked like it was my Gall Bladder. Met with a surgeon and he ordered a few more tests for the following day. Next day (Tuesday) was an MRI and something else, followed by a confirmation from te Doc that indeed, it was my Gall Bladder, it was infected, had gall stones and, to quote him.. "it was hot".
2:30 PM that same day I was in surgery and it was removed using Laproscopy. Talking to the Doc afterwards he said it was scared from previous attacks and he wondered why I wasn't in worse shape from the infection. (Put me on massive IV doses of antibiotics). I'm happy to report
that the next day I was doing really good and was on solid foods already and by Thursday evening (although still *very* tender I was sent home. Doing better every day now, walking without any pain and more importantly able to draw a full lungful of air without pain. My point of all of this is to caution everyone not to just shake off heavy pain and think it's a gas pocket. It can be much worse, from a heart attack to a gall bladder to kidney stones to ??? Take pain seriously, it's natures way of telling you that something isn't right.
I got my Christmas gift early. I'm still alive.