The day has finally come that food can no longer befriend me

A couple of months ago I awoke at 2 am with a stabbing pain in my chest. Oh-oh, this must be it. A heart attack. I closed my eyes and did meditation breaths to control my panic. My husband was at work and I was unsure if this warranted need of an ambulance. After a few minutes, I realized the pain had lessened but was distressingly present and spreading to my back. The first thing that came to mind was to leave a message of encouragement to my loved ones. Do I have time to write one? Are my things in order? Will they remember my wish for cremation or will they bury me instead and I'll have to come back and haunt them? Do ghosts really float everywhere? Like bathrooms and cinemas? Do my family and friends have a decent picture of me or will they just choose one with a bad hair day? What should I wear at my cremation? Do dead people wear clothes at cremations? Should I shave my legs? I sat there in the dark contemplating about the end and how unprepared I was and taking the pain. It slowly dawned on me that if this had been a heart attack I'd be feeling a lot worse and the chest pain would be overwhelming. Sure enough, the hurting gradually subsided and hey, I was still alive. Another notch on my 40 year old belt.

The pain returned twice after that, always at night, like a vampire and then I knew that a visit to the doctor's was inevitable. He wrote up several different tests but was pretty sure the core of my recent unhealthiness might be a gallbladder stone. Turned out he was right. Sediment (gooey stuff) and crystals (sharp stuff) are what causing my uneasiness (spear piercing my chest). As soon as school and university entrance exams for my kids are over, doctor's orders are to have a gallbladder laparoscopy. The procedure itself is routine and very easy on the patient; up in a day, out of hospital in two (hopefully).

The doctor looked at me across his desk and with a stern voice said: "You realize that you have to stop eating certain foods, otherwise the pain will continue".

"I can forfeit food doc. Just try me. But please don't cut me off the chocolate, doc. You don't know how bad it gets doc. I don't care about meats, breads, fruits and vegetables. I N-E-E-D the chocolate, I beg you NOT the chocolate. I'll be good..."

My words were of no avail. Chocolate's out too. As of last week, food and I are no longer on speaking terms. I've had to cut out a lot of things because my gallbladder acts up and hisses at me. O evil sediment and crystals, that you would banish my beloved from my tastebuds, tummy, hips and tooshie. The cruelty of it all!

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