In my quest to subdue the spastic bowel, I’ve finally consented to a colonoscopy. The idea behind it is to rule out any physical problems that can’t be detected, um, externally.
Just for the record, I do NOT want to do this. The last time a doctor suggested one, I went and asked another doctor. And then another doctor. When three different doctors with good recommendations from the people you know all recommend the same thing, it’s time to grit your teeth and let them stick a little camera up your ass. Flashback to Bob the Anal Fissure.
They gave me a couple of bottles of stuff to drink the day before. The nurse explained this to me in very polite terms, mincing around the subject with phrases like “You might not produce after the first one.” However, it’s quite clear that the purpose of this substance is to make me shit my brains out. And a good time was had by all.
They also gave me a little brochure on the procedure, which isn’t called Your Colon and You, but might as well be. There’s a seventies-style drawing of a woman about to chug her Fleet Phospho-Soda. From her expression of serene anticipation, we can infer that she is about to experience something beautiful and sublime. I think it’s safe to say that anyone whose digestive tract is behaving so badly as to warrant such a procedure knows that the results will be neither.
The brochure has drawings of the “flexible colonoscope,” which sounds like something you’d hear rattled off in a string of Star Trek dialog. “Captain, our shields are down and our flexible colonoscope is fluctuating wildly!” Well, let’s hope not. Happily, the brochure also contains the magic sentence: “The patient is mildly sedated.” THANK GOD!
The brochure also says the procedure is “seldom remembered by the patient.” Fine by me. I wonder if he’ll give me some of the pictures.
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