Like the others have said, it's extremely excruciating. I had my one massive stone for about 2 years before I was diagnosed. Apparently I was "too young and too thin" to have gall stones so none of the three different doctors I saw sent me for an ultrasound.

The pain can be very unlocalised and can be felt mostly under the bottom of your rib cage and radiates through to your back as well. The back pain had one doctor put me on anti-inflammatory tablets because he thought it was a back problem. Suffice to say the tablets did nothing besides totally space me out.

Once mine was found it still took a month (with private health insurance!) to have my gallbladder removed. I lost a significant amount of weight (of which I never had much to spare) because I just couldn't eat without having a pain attack.

I finally had surgery and they found one massive stone. My surgeon had me freaked out because he told me that my gallbladder looked different to any he had ever seen and sent it off for pathology testing (this coming from an older surgeon that had been doing this surgery daily for many many years!). Turns out the stone was completely blocking my cystic duct (causing additional pain) and part of my gallbladder had died and becoming swollen and necrotic. Lovely!

I then had stomach issues for about 2 years after the surgery while my body adjusted to not having a gallbladder.

Gallstones are certainly not fun times!