I just thought i'd come back now that i have a diagnosis. All too often, i stuble on posts like these and never find out what happened to people who have symptoms similar to mine. It turns out, I have Collagenous Colitis. It took years of misdiagnosis and many tests, but I finally feel I know what's going on and understand how to treat my symptoms (which had spread from the right side throughout my abdomen and had gotten progressively worse over the last few years since I posted). I hope others are able to solve their mysteries!
Me? Yep! The ultrasound found a slew of gallstones rattling around in there. They had me go in to have a cholecystectomy (or as I call it, gallbladderectomy), assisted by a really slick Da Vinci robotic system a month or so later, with the entire surgery being short enough that I was sent home later that same day. Within a week or two, I was shuffling around the house with feckless abandon, and within a month or two, I was right as rain (which is pretty stunning recovery time, since one would think removal of a commonly known organ would require much longer to bounce back from).
Every so often I have post-cholecystectomy syndrome (or as I like to call it, "the ghost of my gallbladder haunts me"), with very similar symptoms to what I had pre-surgery, but it happens about half as often, with about a quarter of the severity, and only lasting a few minutes instead of a number of hours. Basically, it's no more annoying than a sneezing fit, now.
I'm no doctor (just a Biology major who's read too much Sherlock Holmes), but have you tried lying down on the sofa with a book for 6 hours or so over some weekend? It'd test to see if it's a circadian rhythm thing making it "nicer" in the early day, or if it's the fact that you're prone that's doing it.
Just wondering if any conclusions have been reached by the previous posters. I have had similar experience with constant dull pain in right abdomen in area of gallbladder and kidneys. Blood work and ultrasound came back "normal". I'm 38 and have been on a low fat diet for nearly 3 years now (certainly not overweight). My father did have his gallbladder removed several years back. My symptoms started nearly 2 weeks ago and peaked after 3-4 days. Seems to be getting better now, but still not feeling right. Pain tends to be minimal over night and in morning, but gets worse as the day progresses. Excessive belching starts in afternoon and lasts through evening. I haven't changed my diet recently. Any insights would be appreciated.
Is the pain constant, day in and day out, or does it show up now and again, like a bad penny?
I'm currently in the middle of having my own "Mystery upper-right abdominal pain" examined/diagnosed, between the stage of getting an ultrasound and the stage of finding out the results of said ultrasound. Given the pattern of mine (IE: mostly starts when I'm asleep with the rare instances of shortly before bed or shortly after waking up; is initially distracting/annoying for two or three hours, actual factual pain for a half hour or an hour, fades back to nothing over the course of another half hour or hour; generally happens about three weeks apart with the swiftest reoccurrence being a week apart, the longest about five months apart), my doctor and I are leaning towards some fairly minor gallbladder issue.
From what I can tell, based on my panicked research when it first started happening a bit under year ago, the schedule of the abdominal pain (EG: Does it relate to eating, not eating, drinking, or not drinking? Is it only at a certain time of day?) seems the best initial signpost to follow.