Hestia...is indisposed

I wonder if he can power-hose out the blockage?

Things have not gone quite according to plan since I got out the hospital a fortnight ago.

The first thing that ticked me off was that I still weighed much the same as I went in.  I was hoping for a massive weight loss or at least a sympathetic secret tummy tuck while I was under the blade.  

I would have settled for a gastric band.  

Or even a strategically placed rubber band.  

I was warned to take it easy in the first few days - keeping fat to a minimum.  Which my mother did, scrutinising everything that I put on my plate like a benevolent nazi guard.  Sometimes it was more like a full-on nazi (see Ralph Fiennes) as she eye-rolled at my attempts to craftily eat a Tunnocks Caramel Wafer when I pretended to go to the toilet.  My drug of choice, man.

An alarming byproduct of getting gallbladdered is that my tummy makes many more gurgling noises than it used to.  And they are very loud.  Sonshine actually thought that I was talking to him this evening as we snuggled up on the sofa to plough our way through another episode of the Chelsea Flower Show (honestly they do talk some crap.  Tonight's was fine, but I had to turn Laurence Lewellyn Bowen off).  No offence to the Telly Dandy, but he is to gardening what Diarmud Gavin is to interior design.  

Anyway, I have a tummy that could apparently get three yeses on Britain's Got Talent as a ventriloquist act.

In addition, I am still the colour of an old banana - which alarms me a bit, because I have a robust dermis which doesn't bruise easily.  I dread to think what sort of manhandling went on during surgery.....

The very worst thing of all is that I am still getting sore tummies.  Granted, not the hang-over-the-sink-panting-like-an-old-dog sort of pain, but still the sort of inflamed tenderness that causes me to sit bolt upright in manner of someone with mule bag of cocaine up bottom in Bankok airport departure lounge.

Ah, and this leads me on to the last complaint that I have.  And please feel free to look away now if tales of No Visits To The Toilet upsets you.  Seven days.  My own personal best.

I have been inhaling Lactulose and Movicol to no avail; knocking back up to three fruit smoothies per day.  Porridge for breakfast.  A full 3 meals per day.  Plus the odd Tunnocks Caramel Wafer (After all, Die Fuhere went home a week ago).

'What you need, announced my mother in the regular daily phone call to make sure I'm a) alive and b) sitting watching the correct restorative daytime telly (ie The Wright Stuff) 'is a laxative.'

She proceeded to instruct me in the very kind that I should purchase and off I toddled - in such dangerous gale-force wind (no pun intended, but smile anyway - there are precious few laughs in this posting) that I met not a single soul in the street on my visit).

I entered the Chemist with a happy step - the weather was so bad, no-one was out shopping.  

My heart sank.  

Reader, it was the same assistant whom I had to semaphore my need for Thrush medication a couple of months back.  Dear God, my public humiliation was now complete - thrush and constipation.  Oh what a charmed life I lead.....

I sighed and approached the counter.

'Hello, can I help you?' As she recognised me as the Woman Who Had to Whisper About Her Thrush, her voice again dropped sotto voce.  As did mine.  Oh dear, it was like Groundhog Day in Hell.

'I am a bit constipated.' I said, hoping that no further elaboration was required.

'Ah, erm, how long?' she asked, her professional smile securely plastered in place.

Oh God the shame. The SHAME.  'Seven days, tomorrow. That's not normal for me.  I had my gallbladder removed,' I offered weakly, by way of explanation.

She produced Extra Strong laxatives and acquainted me with instructions 'Don't take more than one in 24 hours and you should see some....change.... about 12 hours after you've taken it.'

I stuffed the tablets into my bag and struggled out into the storm.  It was absolutely brutal.  This is an old town and everyone has innate fear of being hit by falling debris from the old (and poorly maintained) buildings, so I chose to walk on the other side of the road.  At one point I just had to stand and hold on to the railings outside the castle and hope that I didn't take off like a kite.  Would I shit myself if I was killed by a falling chimney stack?  Seemed like a pretty extreme way to get over my constipation.

Back home, I took the tablet.

12 hours passed.  And nothing else.  I laughed in the face of constipation and laxatives and went out to have coffee with my friend the next day.  Still nothing.  Came home.  It was now more than 24 hours since the first tablet.  I took another one.

Reader, by the time  Sonshine came home from school, nuclear war couldn't have got me out of that lavvie.  He banged on the front door, rang on the bell and shouted through the letter box, but there was NO way I was able to get down those stairs to let him in.  

How long did I sit there reading my Nigel Slater book? I have no idea, but I thought my behind was scarred for life, so deeply ingrained was my Ring of Confidence when I stood up.

Eagerly, I hopped on to the scales.  How the heck can this be?! I weighed exactly the same as I had done in the morning.