Occhiolism

Hello friends,

Last week when I posted the first scene of the Court of Blood and Water, my idea was that I would post a scene weekly. However, this week my partner’s father was rushed to the hospital for a suspected heart attacked.

He had already had a heart attack back in November, and so we’ve all been on edge about the health of his heart. Especially, since many years ago (before I met my partner) he had several major heart attacks and he had to have a bypass done.

So most of this week has been spent being unable to work on any writing due to anxiety for him. Luckily, it turned out to be his gallbladder instead of his heart. If you’ve never had trouble with your gallbladder you might be confused as to how it could be mistaken for a heart attack. As someone who never had gallstones but had her bladder removed at 32 because it had the function of a 70yr old… When your gallbladder is aching up it legitimately feels like you are dying.

For years after eating I would feel like I was being stabbed. I’d go to the emergency room in unbearable pain and every time they would look at my gallbladder and shrug their shoulders “no gallstones, must be referred back pain” and send me on my way.

Eventually, my primary caught on to something and suggested we have a HIDA scan done. Let me tell you, that was absolutely painful. It felt like I was being stabbed the entire time. They give you this terrible milky/chalky thing to drink, and then test the function of your gallbladder in real time while you lie as still as possible.

It is not easy to hold still when you are being stabbed, or it feels like it.

My own gallbladder, like I mentioned, was just bad. I never had any stones but my gallbladder functioned about the same as a 70yr old’s. So we had it removed.

This is all to say that, yes. If your gallbladder is full of stones or is just not functioning correctly, it can be confused with a heart attack. Because the pain is utterly terrible. 0/10 would not recommend.

I’m grateful my partner’s father is alright, he came home yesterday, and now we are getting back into routine. I will be posting another scene next week and I am thinking of doing biweekly rather than weekly. Just to have a buffer when life gets rough to handle.

I’m not planning to flake out. Especially not so soon in my attempts at building an audience and a career out of my writing.

Thanks for reading if you’ve made it this far.

• Ashley Apples