Former first lady Barbara Bush is recuperating at a Huston hospital after an ulcer surgery that was performed on Tuesday night. Less than 24 hours after the surgery, the former first lady described the pain she felt before coming to hospital as “worse than childbirth.”

On Tuesday, she complained of stomach pain and called her husband, former President George W. Bush, at his office urging him to take her to the hospital. The 83-year-old former First Lady was hospitalized at the Methodist Hospital in Houston, Texas, Tuesday night. She was suffering severe abdominal pain.

Doctors determined she suffered from perforated ulcer in her duodenum, the first portion of the small intestine after the stomach. She had laparoscopic surgery to repair and seal her perforated ulcer. In such procedures, surgeons insert instruments equipped with a small camera through a small abdominal incision. During the procedure, doctors thoroughly cleaned her abdominal cavity of any contaminants that had leaked through the hole, described by the hospital as being 1 centimeter. Then they repaired the ulcer and used a piece of the omentum, living fat tissue in the abdomen, to sew on top of it to seal it, doctors said.

“I am grateful to the Methodist Hospital (staff), who stayed long hours to take good care of Barbara,” said former President Bush, who stayed overnight at Methodist with his wife.

Barbara Bush will spend at least one or two days in the hospital’s intensive care unit. She is expected to be released next week. She won’t be able to have any food by mouth, as it might affect the newly repaired ulcer.