I forgot to say that I can get very minor and short-lasting relief by drinking a glass of unfiltered apple juice with tablespoon of cider vinegar added.

Epsom salts? Lying on my left(?) side? I haven't tried ibuprofen because of its effect on the liver.

IANAD, but when I had gastritis, which turned out to be pancreatitis, they told me to eat the BRAT diet (bananas, rice, applesauce, dry toast). I added a small amount of chicken every day to that diet, which kept me less malnourished and caused me no problems. Most importantly, eat SMALL meals. Don't give your stomach too much to deal with at one time.

I'm so sorry you're going through this. It sounds awful. I have no personal experience with gallbladder woes but my mom had hers out a few years ago. Two weeks later she went on a month-long trip to Australia and New Zealand. She's been a different person health-wise since it came out ... it's changed her life in a very positive way. I know every case is different but my mindset would be, take the damn thing out ASAP and lets be done with this. But I know plenty of people who want to avoid surgery if at all possible so it's a personal choice of course.

In any case I sincerely hope that you feel better soon and can find a way to get some relief.

Walking around sometimes dislodges the stone that is stuck in you and causing such great pain; but if you have no stones, hmmmm.

Also, I did acupuncture several times when I had my gallstones; it worked and bought me about 6 months of time before the pain got so bad and I consented to surgery.

FWIW, the acupuncture guy said to knock out ALL sugar, including natural sugars like fruit.

I'm so sorry, Specklet. I have to say, though, I'm with Kangaroo on this. I had gynae problems for years and every year I'd see the Consultant and he'd suggest we try something else, and when that didn't work, we'd try another thing. In the end I said, look, let's just draw a line under this, take the damn thing out. I had my hysterectomy in 2003, and it was the best decision I have ever made about my health (except for giving up drinking).

The thought of going on with those gynae problems for years with no treatment guaranteed to do anything more than alleviate the problem for a short time was too much for me to bear.

Just my tuppence-worth.

In the meantime, it goes without saying that there are many whuffles on their way to you.

Specklet, I know this isn't going to be what you want to hear, but in my experience nothing short of Percocet in the short term and then a cholecystectomy helped me. Be mindful of fevers at this point--this can become acute and dangerous if you get a related infection. Sludge can be just as bad as stones as far as getting in the bile duct and blocking it.

Whuffles, honey. I know how horribly it hurts.

However, also don't discount that this might be an ulcer or something else. When I was going through the diagnostic process, they were convinced that in no way was it possible for such a young (29 at the time) woman could need her gallbladder out. They did a ton of tests for other possibilities before even considering the gallbladder. When you say you don't have any stones as confirmed by an ultrasound, that made me wonder just now. Yes, you may have the "sludge" I referred to, and that might be the problem, but it's also worth checking out alternate causes for your pain. GI problems are notoriously difficult to diagnose, it seems.

If the "blobs" are what I'm thinking of as "sludge," however, then I'd feel more like it was for sure gallbladder.

Thanks, guys.

I hear you about the surgery, but my discomfort is relatively (!) mild and this hasn't had enough of an impact on my life to make me consider having it out. I've had phenomenal results with acupuncture for other ailments, and I think that would be very helpful... and changing my diet would be good for me in many ways. When I'm feeling completely better, I may try a cleanse to flush out the gallbladder, but that can only be done when you're not symptomatic.

I of course will see what my doctor has to say.

And yeah, Stew, I'm keeping close tabs of fever and jaundice for sure. I was very glad the ultrasound did not reveal any infection or stones! My hunch is that I've got sludge, but I'll see what my doc says.

This looks like a good patient education site for gallbladder issues:

I found this interesting from there:

Gallbladder Diseases without Stones (Acalculous Gallbladder Disease)
Gallbladder disease can occur without stones, a condition called acalculous gallbladder disease. This refers to a condition in which a person has symptoms of gallbladder stones, yet there is no evidence of stones in the gallbladder or biliary tract. It can be acute (arising suddenly) or chronic (persistent).

* Acute acalculous gallbladder disease usually occurs in patients who are very ill from other disorders. In these cases, inflammation occurs in the gallbladder. Such inflammation usually results from reduced blood supply or an inability of the gallbladder to properly contract and empty its bile.
* Chronic acalculous gallbladder disease (also called biliary dyskinesia) appears to be caused by muscle defects or other problems in the gallbladder, which interfere with the natural movements required to empty the sac.

I know that pain, too, except it snuck up on me. All through August and September I'd ache either on the side or between the shoulder blades. I got on a brief health kick and tried fish oil supplements.

Oh. My. God. It hurt the next day. The only way to make it tolerable was to take a couple of fiber chews with the capsules. But I realized that I needed to really get it taken care of.

I stopped the fish oil and just kept going with the fiber chews and started things rolling with my DO. (oh, and Beano is a lifesaver when it comes to the gas generated by fiber chews)

Ultrasound showed no stones anywhere. And god it hurt to get that done, I was so sore.

I was sent to a different gastroenterologist than before because the first one wanted to yank the thing, and I like having all my original parts,tyvm. My mother and sister had theirs out, and my Mom was forced to a no fat diet. I wanted another opinion.

So this one said, well, if you can control the pain with diet, sure, we can leave it in, but let's see if it actually works.

So, nuclear scan. Take warm clothes if you're going to do it because you lie still on a very cold slab for hours while they irradiate and then try to get it to contract and take pictures.

My ejection fraction was 10%, nowhere near the "normal" of 30%. The radiologist report on the ultrasound and this scan was "well, it could be a floating stone (thought I saw one in one pic) or a sphicnter of oddi problem or chronic cholycistitis." Thanks for being specific, dude.

So I got an ERCP. The procedure was fine, but I was apparently one of the few people that can get pancreatitis from it. That landed me in the hospital with more pain than labor. The result of the scan, though, was that there was no blockage anywhere in the system. No stuck stones, no constricted ducts. They figured I was making and expelling sludge.

So back to the doc, who recommended I get the thing out, because it clearly wasn't working, and even with diet changes I had random pain.

So with four opinions now, I had it done. Since I'd cut down on fat and upped the fiber, there was no inflammation, but damn if it didn't look pale and sick. (they gave me a picture).

The upshot is that you may be inflamed, and that needs to be taken care of first with less fat in the diet and fiber and pain pills (and you'll find that even that "minor" pain has been holding you back).

Get thee to a doctor and don't be afraid to ask what else can be done if you're not for surgery. But if it's not doing anything for you and is working against you, I think it's going to be better to have it out.

I've got no restrictions on my diet except to up the fiber intake, and I've done that.

On preview:
Specklet, I've not seen evidence that a flush will do anything. If the organ itself cannot constrict, nothing is going to get a stone out if it's there. My mother had emergency surgery, and they had to remove a good chunk of the bile duct.

Stewie: that's exactly what I had. I haven't seen the pathology report, but I expect to next week, and that's what I think they'll conclude.

what can I do in the short term to ease my symptoms?

Gosh, poor Specklet! Your symptoms sound quite different from mine. I had really awful disabling attacks which left me shaking and vomiting and in extreme pain, but they were obviously caused by a stone blocking the duct because all of a sudden the pain would Just Go (because the stone moved back somewhere harmless) and I would feel fantastic. In between attacks I'd feel more or less normal.

The stones would move and block the duct if I ate any amount of fat - half an ounce of cheese triggered the attack, and I know it was the cheese because I'd been attack-free on a fat-free diet for two weeks, but this cheese tempted me because I was so hungry. Two hours later, bam.

In theory I'm a fan of keeping my original parts, but because I couldn't continue having such incapacitating attacks, and because I would have had trouble sustaining a completely fat-free diet over the long term (even olive oil would set it off) it was a no-brainer to opt for surgery. Surgery was horrid but totally worth it for me.

Here my expertise runs out, as I don't know much about the kind of disease in which there are no obvious stones, and I didn't see any evidence that gallbladder flushes and herbal medicines would help me. All I can say is take care and I hope your GP is giving you the help you need and answering all your questions.

I feel your pain! Please try drinking pineapple juice! You have to try it. I was scheduled to get my gall bladder out and tried the pineapple chug-a-lug and never had another gb attack, that was about 5 yrs ago now I think. I had about 40 attacks, they kept getting worse. I researched natural cures online and came across the website of a natural, raw, vegan guru who called herself dr. flora. This was her method.

I don't have any explanation for why it worked. The bromelain gets to, and dissolves the fat and stones in your gb, supposedly. I don't know if that's how it works, I just know that it worked for me. Just buy some pineapples. Let them ripen. Every morning before you eat or drink anything, juice one. You take off the skin, lop off the top and the bottom, and the core, and juice everything else. You should end up with a mugful or so. Chug it - drink it as fast as you can. Don't eat or drink for an hour.

Do that every day for a week. Second week, do it every other day. Third week, every three days. After that, do it once a week.

I know, it sounds crazy, and too easy, and too damned delicious. But it worked for me, it's worked for others, and it may work for you. You're only out the price of some pineapples.

Very short term? Like....while you're having an attack? Drink a tsp of epsom salts dissolved in a cup of warm water. It's disgusting, but stops the attack within 10 minutes or so. If you have the nagging feeling that an attack is coming on, drink it then.

I have no advice, only the whuffles. Always the whuffles.

You poor dear! You have my deepest sympathies!!!

My best suggestions for dealing with it short term are as follows;

If it's twinging and grumbly, try sleeping sitting upright. After my last horrible attack, the damn thing grumbled and twinged for two weeks solid and I was scared to lie down in case it started all over again. I slept propped up on a huge pile of pillows and the grumbling eased off.

Once it eases, try sleeping on your right side. I find the stones tend to "fall away" from the duct and obstruct it less if I do. YMMV, though.

Don't be scared to manage your pain. Ask your GP for something stronger than over-the-counter stuff. I ended up getting some form of codeine (which your body processes into morphine). It didn't make the pain go away, but it did knock it back to bearable levels. Just being able to relax and sleep will make everything else less horrible.

And try to rest. My last big attack landed me in ER and the morphine did nothing. It eventually passed but I felt like crap for weeks. My bowels were in an uproar, eating anything felt like tempting fate and, as I said, I was too scared to lie down. But after a couple of weeks, everything settled down. I think that the stones shifted position and probably bruised things and it took that long for everything to heal and relax.

Regarding diet, I've had gallstone attacks after eating fatty food, non-fatty food, and after no food at all! Weight-loss (sad to say) can also trigger it (because the fat that you're losing has to be processed out of the body, and some of it goes through the liver, which asks for bile which comes from the gallbladder etc etc). So, if you're going to do weightloss, slow is better.

Regarding supplements, you might like to do some research into ursodioxycolic acid, which is essentially bear bile, as used in Chinese Traditional Medicine to treat gall bladder problems. If, like us, you don't fancy making bears suffer, there's a synthetic alternative around (can't remember the name). It's generally sold to weightlifters as part of a liver-support program (they taking so many odd supplements that their livers need all the help they can get, apparently). The product we were using was called "Liver Longer" which is rather hard to get and expensive, but did seem to help. The idea being that it will help flush the small crap through your gall-bladder and can partly dissolve existing stones, if they are the right type (made from cholesterol).

Hope this helps. :)

Thanks, everybody. I'm sorry to hear so many of you suffer from gallbladder ailments, and so much worse than mine!

I'm happy to say I'm feeling better today. I'm still uncomfortable and twingy, but last night I didn't have any those bouts of stabbing pains, and slept well. I ate a very small dinner and even had wine, which seems to have gone down okay. I'm still scared to eat, but hey, what you gonna do. I'm going to take some Epsom salts when I get home (at work on a Saturday, so sad) and see if that reduces the twinges.

My plan of attack: diet change, mainly eliminating saturated fats, and eating very small meals. I'd love to drink fresh pineapple juice everyday, but I don't have a juicer and pineapples are mighty scarce in England. (I wonder if a good quality bought juice would do...) I understand that malic acid can act as a solvent to break down bile sludge or blobs, so apple juice may help. I'll also be drinking lemon juice in warm water in the morning: it supposedly helps lessen the liver's workload and strengthen its enzymes. I'll see if I can afford acupuncture and in the meantime will probably not look into ursadioxycolic acid, but rather a Chinese herb called Gold Coin Grass.

In regards to the cleanse with olive oil and lemon juice: I think that this might be a bit harsh for me to try, but I'll think about it later. It works by stimulating bile production and making the gall bladder contract, which can flush out sludge and stones. They tell me I don't have any stones, but sludge can be just as bad. There is some controversey about the effectiveness of this. I think that most of the people who claim they've passed 200 stones OMG!!1! are actually counting solidified blobs of olive oil in the toilet, but there are people who have had actual solid stones flushed out. Anyway, it's not something to do if you're already not feeling well, so I'll wait on that one.

I did over 20 of the oil and juice cleanses, for what it's worth. It was olive oil and grapefruit juice. They didn't work. Nothing worked for me except the pineapple juice chugging.

I wonder if a good quality bought juice would do

No, sorry, it has to be fresh, and drunk right away. Bet you could find a good used juicer for sale somewhere online.

Okay, ico. Fresh pineapple juice would be so yummy...

For me, surgery was a miracle. I suffered for so long without knowing what was wrong (my own fault for avoiding the doctor for so long). For over a year, I'd wake up with terrible cramping pain in my gut and be up two or three hours until the Advil kicked in. After awhile the Advil didn't work anymore. I finally went to the Emergency Room at Columbia-Prysbeterian one night when I couldn't stand it anymore. It took a second visit for them to diagnose me, though. And even then, the surgeon wasn't sure it would do the trick. At that point, I told him that if there was a chance it would help, please do it. I was desperate. The long-term chronic pain had worn me down (my pain was atypical -- both in my upper and lower right side, and then sometimes generalized). I had the surgery that afternoon (laproscopic, which was not bad at all -- much, much less pain than an abdominal incision), and that evening, I could already feel that the awful cramping pain I'd suffered for more than a year was gone. I was so grateful to my surgeon.

As it turned out, I did not have stones. They thought they saw them on the ultrasound, but there weren't any. They figure it was sludge/a functioning problem. Since the surgery did the trick, though, it was definitely my gallbladder. I did still have cramping on and off for a few months as my system adjusted, but no problems since, and it's been over three years, and I can pretty much eat whatever I want, though I was warned about overdoing the fatty foods (I will say beware of Vegas buffets, though).

Bottom line, if you need it, the surgery's not bad, and, at least in my case, it really did the trick. I was walking around that very night and out of the hospital the next day. Still, I know it's a big decision, but if your doctor recommends it as a serious option, I'd go for it.

(If it's worse when you eat, by the way, that does lean towards the gall bladder, rather than stomach.)

Hope you feel better.

Will the NHS cover acupuncture?