Good luck. Did they give you the stone? Mine was the size of a small chicken egg and looked like rusty iron. I cut it in half with a Dremmel wheel, and inside was opaque glass-like crystal spokes, all pointing into the centre. They hoiked it out of a hole so small that it left about a 10mm scar.
The real danger for me was that the bladder had become inflamed...but gave very little warning (one undiagnosed episode a month or so before) until I became very ill late one night. It was then mis-diagnosed as a spasm of the sphincter–at the top of the stomach–by the midnight visiting doctor. 15 pethidine pills later I was a blue light job to an Essex hospital. It took a week on a drip to stabilise. A very conscientious surgeon, who had picked up on the fact that I was commuting to the US, called me from his car and offered to take it out the next day if I went private. The anaesthetist rolled up in his gardening clothes, and the small team were very jolly...until they saw the bladder: it was covered in black patches.
The point of all this is, that once I was feeling better, it was deemed a non critical problem. With a lot of traveling, I would have been at great risk by trying to carry on a normal life while waiting the 8 months for the NHS. I felt perfectly well 15 mins before being very unwell, hence my laboring the point about aircrew not delaying the procedure after the first episode.
My thanks to that surgeon, he could well have saved my bacon.
N.B. This comment is based on one person that could not have surgery because of emphysema, but did have recurring problems with positively diagnosed gallstones. There is some evidence to show that it is just possible, that lying on the right side and pummeling deep into the gall bladder area might release the blockage and save a lot of pain. Mine released while being rolled onto the trolley, the relief was beyond description.