I am not sure exactly what the boundaries of “clear liquids” are, but since they let you have jello, I’m sure you could have aspic?

Yikes!

Many good wishes for a fast and easy recovery.

NBC has been showing hours and hours of Olympic trials, and I think there are more online...

Years ago, I had to have a no chewing liquid diet from oral surgery. I made popsicles. Like chicken stock popsicles, which to your question: pepper. More black pepper in a popsicle than in actual chicken soup. But can you have spices? Like orange jello with five spice? Black cherry jello with ginger and (liquified) tarragon? And pepper in the broth? As in your last question. And if aspic, does that include the goo from jarred gefilte fish? Neat's foot jelly? With lots of pepper? I'm guessing not, since your alimentary system has been traumatized, but I haven't a clue of reality.

If you can have anything unlumpy liquid version of clear, I'm sure your delightful offspring could produce all kinds of interesting jello using baker's gelatin, as well as popsicles and soups. Carrot and onion jigglers with fenugreek. Swiss chard and seared beef popsicles. Roasted eggplant consommé....

That said, whatever you have to eat to give you the best healing is worth the boredom.

Poor thing! It sounds hellish.

Yikes. "he's fine" should definitely have been the opener.

Most commercial powdered soup bases/boullions are pure poison/salt licks.

Clear liquid diets are usually short lived, 24hours? Hope so.

I'm guessing it is just to keep you hydrated.

Like plllog, i've had to go on a liquid diet no problem. May have been three days. Juicing fruits and vegetables, Fresh fruit, lemon, ginger ice cubes in water/seltzer. Broth, (homemade). Miso, then blendered green juices. As long as it went through a straw.

My master stocks are concentrated but cut 50/50 with water might pass as 'clear'.

Last night in bed I was catching up on your kitchen reno on the low calorie cooking thread. This morning I see this, a true low calorie diet! Sorry to hear of this escalation, and certainly hope your hospital stay and discomfort are brief.

I wish I knew what to suggest for this diet, but no salt makes it a tough one. How long does this go on? One thing that jumped out at me right away was the thought that you’re teasing yourself with the jello and broth. In my limited experience with intermittent fasting, I’ve found that hunger pangs dissipate until I have my first taste of food. Assuming they’re only starving you for a short while longer, or unless you need broth and jello for nutritional reasons, I’d be inclined to stick to water and black coffee.

But then, this tends to be my preferred approach in general. Whether it’s dieting, quitting smoking, quitting drinking, etc., I find maximizing mental avoidance easier than obsessing over coping which keeps it in the forefront of your mind.

Anyway, hope this is all behind you quickly!

Clear/no pulp fruit juices and clear electrolyte drinks. Pickle juice is a flavor spike to savory things, if you like pickle juice. You can make a green herb juice/slurry- it has to be strained back to clear since you can't have any little herb bits yet. Bone broths and sipping teas- again make sure they are the clear kind, not the opaque and got stuff in it kind.

Don't do coffee or higher caffine teas. But white tea and fruit teas that don't contain black tea are OK, you can add in lemon juice and honey. Mint is good too.

I really like this broth, Rebbeca Katz Magic Mineral Broth.

https://www.rebeccakatz.com/recipe-box/miracle-mineral-broth

It’s never a good thing when a surgeon is surprised by what they find! Hopefully it’s all done, you feel better, and you heal soon. The hospital offerings for liquid are pitiful but typical. How long must you stay on clear liquid?! I would want salty broth and caffeinated full-sugar soda (can’t drink coffee black) for energy.

OMG - kind of terrifying about the condition of your GB - can they rupture and cause peritonitis? Glad it's been taken care of!

And I'd have lots of teas/infusions and fresh broths instead of boullion - also lots of gelatins - wonder if agar is allowed? Is flavored sparkling water OK?

And not to be a downer but day 3 is often when the pain rears its ugly head...

I love the jello dinner project! I can't imagine what's left if you strain liquified potato. Not much, I reckon. How about toasting potato starch and liquifying? Or make an infusion of roasted potato peels and chives, strain, reduce, gellify. Or maybe add a little nutritional yeast, if you're allowed to have it, to mimick a bit of fat flavor.

Carrot-fennel jello sounds intriguing. ;)

BTW, often, part of the reason for the Jell-o is the sugar, to keep your energy up, and the broth is for the protein. The coffee and tea are for the caffeine addicts. They don't want them going all jittery and have withdrawal headaches. Make sure to get plenty of protein and carbs while you're eschewing fats.

More good wishes floating your way...

No suggestions because great ones already offered. I’ll just add my best wishes for a speedy recovery.

@carolb_w_fl_coastal_9/10, yes, the risk of rupture and resulting peritonitis is why they remove gallbladders with large gallstones. Back when I still had mine, I was told that if I had severe pain and vomiting I was to go to the emergency room immediately.

My doctor said that she and her partners are seeing the worst gallbladders of her career now. She thinks that Covid and then staffing shortages delayed many gallbladder removals so the organs have had four more years to deteriorate. Interesting - I rather suspect that may be the case in other disease areas too.

That makes some sense, what your doctor said. People also just delayed optional procedures these past few years. You are healthy and fit, you will bounce right back. Try to take it easy while your body recovers. You strike me as an over doer. LOL

Liquified greens and steaks are not clear liquids, just as a smoothie is not a clear liquid. The closest you're getting to potatoes is maybe some starchy water in which they were boiled, no actual potatoes. No miso oryeast is going to be approved either. Semi-clear is not clear ... that would be liquid diet, not clear liquid.

The purpose of a clear liquid diet is to provide a form of bowel rest or to give a gentle restart to the digestive system. This is common after many surgeries, even when they go as planned. This is because anaesthesia slows and/or stops the gut. Until they are sure that things are started up properly and going through, they're not going to give you solid foods, as they may cause you to vomit. They're letting you eat liquids; that's the first step. Be thankful your board doesn't say NPO ... that's what it will say if you go too fast and vomit.

You will not be able to get solid food until the doctor(s) is/are convinced that clear liquids are going well, and you will not be able to go home until after you have reach the same state with solid foods. Feeling great while NPO or on clear liquids will not skip any steps for you. This is standard practice. They want to make sure that you remain not nauseated ... and that process takes time.

If you had to have a washout, you may be able to go home before they remove the drain, in which case they will give you drain care instructions and remove it at a follow-up ... that'll depend on the drain's output and possibly some imaging.

To actually answer the question:

Get your family to bring in non-boullion broth. Not soup. Broth. You should be able to see through it, and there should be nothing floating in it. You can gel it if you want, but it has to be clear, not cloudy with bits and herbs, fully see-through. Make sure to ask if you have a sodium restriction before they bring the broth, so that it can be tailored if necessary.

Also, get your own tea bags ... you can brew any flavor; they're all clear ... hospitals have limited options.

If you like Trix cereal, ask if you can get Ensure Clear in the mixed fruit flavor. It's not sweet, but the best description I have for it is like drinking trix cereal. It's the best clear liquid option most hospitals can offer, in my opinion. It will not be on the menu, and it may need to be ordered by the nurse/doctor. (It is red, so if you have a test that forbids red coloring, you may not be allowed to have it ...) The apple one is meh.

DO NOT order hospital fish. I do not care how nice they make it sound in the description. It will definitely not be "yum-yum" ... it will have been held too long and started out mildly or fully overcooked. If you're lucky it'll be semi-edible; otherwise, you piece of salmon will garner comments along the line of "that's a sad looking piece of chicken," and you'll be able to pick it up whole by stabbing it with a fork (no bending or breaking). Oh, and don't get your hope too high for anything on the menu; it may take close to an hour to come up to your room, and it will taste like it's been sitting that long ... order accordingly.

Thank-you! I wrongly thought it meant without anything textured or floating in it, not no color. The whys are very interesting and useful to know as well.

So I was released from the hospital today, upon verification of no nausea, normal GI function, not much draining, etc. Instructions are rest for a few days, no lifting over 20 lb for two weeks. I felt good when I got home. The electrical inspector is coming tomorrow and wants to see a board covering all wires leaving the panel top, so I table sawed some wood using my table saw and got on a stool to drill and screw in the board and its frame to the basement joists. Um, now I don’t feel so good. So, I guess I’ll take the post-op instructions more seriously.

The clear liquid diet is, thankfully, no longer a necessity but remains an interesting thing to pursue. The basic question is, how much flavor can you have without solids or much color (colored jello was ok at the hospital). I seem to recall there are some Modernist cooking techniques for creating intensely flavored clear liquids - anyone read about that?

colleen, my doctors said if I had severe pain and vomiting during attacks - which I always did, for hours and hours - to take pain meds.

I eventually discovered that oxycodone IR 5-10 mg taken at the start of an attack would block the pain and nausea and put me straight to sleep to awaken the next morning with the attack in the unfelt past. So I lived with the attacks for another several years.

Yes, after a decade my original prescription of oxy had run out, but we’re at the age when friends are getting joint replacements so I’d tell SWMBO ”hey, I heard our friend B is getting her ____ replaced, can you see if she got any opiods and get me a few”. SWMBO would explain to her friend that her husband’s surreptious drug-seeking behavior was for his gallbladder and nothing to worry about, and return with a few pills which I’d take during the next attack. However, and for obvious reasons, doctors have gotten pretty stingy with “the good stuff” and many friends are being sent home with new joints and - in my opinion - less effective painkillers. Tramadol, Vicodin, hydromorphone, these are all very well but don’t do anything for gallstone attacks.

So I finally got tired of cadging unsatisfactory drugs off alarmed friends and had the organ removed.

What I never thought about was that even if oxycodone meant I didn’t suffer during an attack, the attack still happened, and each one did more damage to the gallbladder.

Color is fine ... it just needs to be see-through. Jell-o is see-through (basically gelatin, sugar, and food coloring). Broth, when done as a clear liquid, is see-through ... like the stuff that comes out the cartons from the grocery story that looks like apple juice or tea. Apple juice, cranberry juice, fruit punch ... all part of a clear liquid diet.

Milk and orange juice are no go; even if it's skim milk and no pulp juice, they're not see-through.

Wine and beer are technically clear liquids, though they will likely be excluded for their alcohol ... that's a separate restriction, though, much like sodium restrictions tend to be a separate restriction.

Your typical medical diets will fall into two categories: food type restrictions and content restrictions. The first is about what your system is ready for or based on ability restrictions. This includes diets such as 'clear liquid diet,' 'liquid diet,' and 'low residue diet.' These are meant to put less stress on your system or avoid a certain stressor or action (i.e. liquid diet = no chewing needed; low residue diet = less reaching and being processed by the bowel.) The second is usually more of a cummulative thing for your overal consumption of food and includes restrictions such as 'low sodium,' 'low salt,' and 'low fiber.' There's some overlap, such as 'low residue' and 'low fiber' often being pretty similar, but the latter tends to be more of a daily restriction than per item restriction. Sodium/salt restrictions are usually made out of concern for fluid retention or other medical reasons ... they're really not just trying to make your food bland (bland diet is its own thing but usually not salt related,) and they usually have some number of mg per day or per meal that you can have ... they calculate as you order.

Certain tests will also impose dietary requirements due to interference; these can fall into either category. Examples of this would be: prohibition on red/purple colored foods prior to a colonoscopy or surgery (because the coloring messes with the doctor's ability to see what he or she needs to see), a low residue diet prior to imaging (because they need a section of the bowel to be free from content to see whichever organ they're looking at well), or restriction on calcium intake before a bone density scan (because it can skew the results in some way.) Do not try to weedle around pre-test instructions ... just follow whatever the paperwork says without trying to find loopholes and grey areas. Otherwise, you may just have to prep for the test a second time.

John Liu, glad you were able to get out of the hospital.

Yes, you really do need to take it easy for a bit. Your body is recovering and will do so faster if you let it focus on the recovery. The lifting restriction is very important. You had surgery, and if you do something that causes too much strain, you could open up sutures or otherwise damage yourself, which will land you right back in the hospital. If they say "a gallon of milk" (about 8lbs) 10 pounds or 20 pounds is your limit, then that's your limit until the next follow up when they can assess and clear you for more. (And 20lbs does not mean 20lb per hand, unless that's what they specifically stated it meant; it also doesn't mean that it's okay to move heavy objective so long as you don't technically lift them - you can tear your sutures shoving a heavy box, too.)

Thank you, BB! Your information is comprehensive and great.

I’ve never had surgery or even stayed overnight in a hospital, this is all new to me.

The electrical inspector is also requiring me to move my freezer, because it is one inch too close to the panel we replaced. Minimum clearance is supposed to be 32” and we have 31”, something like that. So the freezer had to be strapped to a dolly and moved ten feet to some random location in the basement. I had DS and DD do that!

This panel replacement has been a pain. Originally, it couldn’t be done because the panel location was too close to the laundry sink (code violation). When the panel filled up, I added a subpanel, but now that I want to add an emergency generator with automatic switchover, it will be much better to have the key circuits, that will be run by the generator, all on the main panel. So last winter DS stacked the washer and dryer, which gave me room to move the laundry sink over a couple feet. But there’s been drama with the panel replacement itself - rather a funny story, which I’ll tell in a bit.

John - Glad you’re home and now committed to relaxing for recovery. And glad you are allowed to eat normal so that you can pursue the clear liquid diet out of curiosity, not necessity. I do recall some molecular gastronomy flavor extraction. Was it a centrifuge, or a pacojet? Dunno, but for some reason my thoughts keep coming back to peas.

I’m an oxy hoarder, too, finding it’s really the only thing that works for me for severe pain. The problem - which might be a blessing in disguise - is that it’s so scarce for me that I’m hesitant to reach into my stash when I most need it.

Possibly of interest: The other day I went to a joint replacement information session at a local orthopedic group. One thing they said is a common mistake is for people to “tough it out” without pain meds. Reason being, pain can hold you back from performing the optimal movement and exercise with PT. Obviously this doesn’t apply to you in your situation, but I thought I’d share.

"pain can hold you back"

Yup, which is why unless there's a concern about the substance being in the house, it's often recommended to fill the prescription for the stronger drug even if one doesn't expect to need it. Of course, this is also how I ended up with a baggy full of expired, unused narcotics to drop off at the police station's drug take back last time we went through the cabinet (note: the cabinet is 12" deep with plenty of space for things to get lost behind the extra kitchen towels, the dog's heartworm meds, and the bottles of statins labelled with the adverse reaction they caused.) I think there were a couple ancient bottles with a couple Vicodin from after wisdom teeth removal, some bottles of Tramadol of various ages, dosages, and owners (some were the dog's, too), something codeine related, and I think there was a bottle or two with one of two oxy or Dilaudid pills.

Interesting hydromorphone didn't work on your gallstone attacks. I though it was technically stronger than oxy, though it would depending on dosing, and maybe it's the wrong mechanism or action or just doesn't work as well with your body/brain chemistry, since hydromorphone only has a minor affinity with delta and kappa opioid receptor (mu-type receptors are the primary binding point on which both act.)

BB, I was curious about that too. Some reading suggests delta receptors might be more active in inflammatory processes and kappa in visceral pain? So maybe one opiod drug might be more suited to post operative pain while another more to internal and inflammation pain. I don’t know. Do individual chemistries vary much? I know vicodin has never had any effect on me, while it knocks SWMBO for a loop. Anyway, I’m a big fan of oxycodone. Dosage - when I’m taking the leftovers from a 2009 prescription, I figure the drug has lost potency. I know in 2009 a 5 mg pill completely eliminated kidney stone pain, frighteningly effective, but two of those fifteen year old 5 mg pills is needed for a gallbladder attack today. Oh, I guess that’s past tense, ”was”, for me now :-)

FOAS, ”oxy hoarder” ha ha! We are a disreputable lot but I guess it’s better to hoard them than to use them!

It is remarkable to me how many friends are having joints replaced and how good the results are.

On the other side, I'm the one who took away the opiates from my parents, post-op. Fine for the immediate extreme pain, but both after a few days became loopy with altered personalities. At that point, they did fine on OTC pain relievers, even though we were told they wouldn't be. Grr. I do hear you both that you're careful, but please be super-careful, okay? We like your normal selves!

Re dates, I read about a study done by the military. They have to stockpile medicines for major emergencies, and they tested everything. There were like half a dozen which degraded over ten years, but the multitudes else were just fine. Or something like that.

Dilaudid/hydromorphone, I think, is the one of the go to post-surgical opioid. It's frequently the drug that's put in PCA pumps (those devices where the patient gets a button that they can press, and the device will give a controlled dose of analgesic so long as they haven't received a dose too recently.) I, personally, found the PCA pump totally useless ... didn't even work as a placebo (and yes, I may have been running experiments with the silly things to make sure it was as useless as I thought it was.) Oddly, dilaudid did work when they gave me a push for bladder spasm pain (they dealt with the spasms themselves, once someone identified what I was complaining about), just did nothing in a PCA ... my guess is that my body could metabolize or otherwise neutralize the small dose faster than it could do anything. (I metabolize medications quite quickly ... all of them, always have.) My preferred pain drug is acetaminophen regardless of where I am or whatfor I need analgesia.

I do find that different drugs work different for different people. I'm assuming that is differences in metabolism and chemistry.

There are a few drugs that degrade into something potentially dangerous/toxic (I can't think of an example, but they exist), but most just lose potency, which poses the risk of making the pill an unknown dosage.

I believe Rx bottles almost always list an expiration of 1 year. You can look up a drug specific expiration timeline through which ... probably the FDA ... has tested and found the drug to maintain efficacy. (I believe the 1 year date takes into account the potential age of the drug before being bottled, simplifies across the majority of drugs, and builds in a level of safety.)

Back to the clear liquid thing, it dawned on me that bone broths are sold in so many stores now - seems like a good choice?

And glad to know you're improving John, here's hoping that continues 🙂

The one year date, as I understand it, is so you'll throw out good medicine and rebuy it. There may be some that lose efficacy, but I think they said not in a significant way. I may be misremembering, but the conclusion, IIRC, is that they really were good for 10 years, not just usable with caveats about changing dosages. And, of course, doctors don't want folks at home dosing themselves with old meds the doctor didn't even know they had and were taking.

I think the concern with loss of potency is that people will double up and overdose.

It's probably a combination of money grabbing from pharmaceuticals and pharmacies covering their butts ... I lean towards pharmacies covering their butts: not going to get sued for a premature expiration date; patients can take it past that date at their own risk.

You're absolutely on the nose about the doctors, though pharmacies seem to lackthat concept and will refill and request new prescriptions "to be helpful" even when they shouldn't. I had a doctor ask me if I was taking something at one point because the pharmacy had decided to call the doctor's office for a new prescription for an inactive prescription because it was lapsing on date. He was relieved when I told him that I would have asked before taking something if the pharmacy had called me to pick something up without prior discussion ... apparently some people will just blindly take whatever if the pharmacy says its ready.

Sorry to be late to the thread, but I hope your recovery continues to goes well. At least the Tour de France has started, so you have plenty of cycling to watch.

The goal here seems to be "clear liquid" and that is a lot different from a vegetable smoothie. Clear liquid offers not much of anything for dinner. The best that can be done is to just bear it as it is usually not for extended times. I think that one reason I hate apple juice is because it is number one on the clean liquid menu.

I am surprised that white wine was not on your menu. When I had my appendix removed in Sonoma, the hospital gave me a wine list.

Lars, perhaps it was the Sonoma of it all.

Re what's a clear liquid, my Vita-mix plus a good strainer, and/or cheese cloth, can liquify just anout anything ;) That may not be what was needed in this case, but that's the kind of thing I meant up topic. Too tasty might be the wrong thing for see if you don't puke described by BB as the purpose.

John, DH had his gall bladder out Apr 1. He'd never had a surgery, never been ill - with anything at all. It went like text book but his post op instructions a little different than yours. He had a 10# not 20# weight restriction and for almost 4 weeks. That one was tough, we have an acre and he's used to being outside and busy. Friends pitched in and helped. But still, he followed his surgeons instructions. What the surgeon had said was two of those little 4 incisions would have a tendency to herniate otherwise which would mean another corrective surgery and he wanted no part of that. He stayed low fat for a full 8 weeks following too (to give the bile duct time to start to take the place of gall bladder and more or less become its own 'pouch') then began adding some things back gradually. No bacon, really no pork, no butter, no brisket burgers. When eating out, he was ordering a whole lot of tomato basil soup when I'm not sure I'd ever seen him eat tomato soup. He was doing portion control willingly too, another thing I'd really never seen him do. It's been three months now and he's pretty much back to normal although still more conscious of his fats than he once was, keeps portions small if something of a high fat content.

*The brunch plate that had sent him running for ER pre-surgery was three eggs, hash browns, bacon, buttered english muffins. I don't think he ate another egg for 10 weeks.

He's had a quite easy time. I think he took 3 or 4 of the oxy (one cut in half) in the first day and a half then only tylenol and was fine. Surgeon was surprised he'd had so little discomfort.

I'm late to this thread also but I'm glad to see that you have been cleared to eat actual food and have decided to take it easy for a couple of days. Ashley and Elery have both had gallbladders removed and they both feel much better now, so I hope you have a quick and complete recovery, having gotten rid of that particularly petulant organ.

Elery just had his second hip replacement, that makes two hips and a knee. All that long distance running, according to the doc. Anyway, the first hip he was in the hospital for 3 days. Knee, same thing. This time we were at the hospital at 7 am, surgery took 45 minutes, we were on our way home at 2. They gave him a turkey sandwich after surgery and a cup of coffee, along with a prescription for Naproxen. No oxy, no vicodin, no tramadol, just Naproxen and ice and see you in two weeks. It was amazing the difference that 5 years makes. His recovery was much slower too, but the doc says it's because he's "older", so it's a good thing you got your surgery done now, before you get any "older"!

Good luck with that jello and that inspector!

Annie