Well, that wasn't so bad

[dreamshark]

A colonoscopy is the most entertaining of medical procedures. The very idea of it is endlessly amusing to your friends and colleagues, giving them a chance to make that joke about hoping it all comes out all right in the end  *har har*.  If said friends are over 50, there is the added entertainment value of comparing prep routines in hushed whispers. It turns out there are as many variations on that as there are doctors. Weird.

Then, of course, there's the interesting experience of fasting to the point where swigging a gallon of liquid laxative almost seems like a welcome alternative to another glass of juice. I wasn't as hungry as I thought I would be during two days of juice fast, but I sure was sick of apple juice. Everything tastes sweeter when you're hungry, and eventually that juice started tasting like the stuff you put in hummingbird feeders. Blech. Everybody told me how terrible the GoLytely tastes, but I didn't think it really tasted BAD; it just tastes like something you shouldn't really be drinking (specifically, sea water). The clinic nurse recommended flavoring it with lemonade crystals, which I did. That stuff really does taste awful, but awful in a different over-sweetened way that sort of cancels out the disturbing saltiness. Anyway, it wasn't as hard as I expected to chug down an 8-ounce glass. It takes 14 gulps.

The real entertainment takes place at the Enterology Department, of course. The worst thing they do to you is stick a needle in your arm, which just isn't fun at all. But once the stuff starts flowing through that IV you start feeling a lot better about everything. Even if you get a doctor like mine who seems to enjoy the entire procedure way too much, his stupid jokes sound funny when you're full of Schedule II narcotics. You can watch the pictures of the inside of your colon on the monitor, which really is pretty interesting if you can stay awake. Time flies when you're that stoned. Before you know it, they've handed you over to your designated driver for a pleasant trip home, still buzzed on happy drugs.

And then you get to eat dinner. Yum. Strangely enough, after two days on a low-fiber diet and two more on juice, the thing I was craving was vegetables. I had Richard cook me a great big batch of butternut squash from his dad's garden. I made a big spinach salad, and we topped it all off with little rounds of stuffed salmon from Trader Joe's. Delicious.

Best of all, the doctor told me I don't have to come back for 10 years! I may have been a little spaced out, but I remember that.

Comments

Colonoscopies

[markiv1111.livejournal.com]

I can't quite say I find these fascinating, but you and I are pretty much the same age and I may wind up needing/getting one of these at some point. This is one of the (few) things Ronald Reagan did for the country: Because of his colon cancer, this suddenly became a topic people could discuss. And I would not be at all surprised if the new publicity that colon issues achieved after Reagan's health scare will, because it got people to talk about it, ultimately lead to people being healthier. And I really do want my friends to take care of their health. So there you have it.

Nate

Re: Colonoscopies

[dreamshark.livejournal.com]

Actually, you're supposed to start getting them at age 50. Hop to it!

The nice thing about this particular screening test is that if it comes up clear you can pretty much cross colon cancer off your list of things to worry about for the next 10 years (or 3-5 if they find any polyps). Colon cancer grows very slowly.

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

I'm glad it went well.

After my experience with very little sedation for my endoscopy, I turned down sedation for the colonoscopy, then took a small amount midway through when things got pretty uncomfortable (the doctor said I had a lot of twists and turns). But I never felt anything remotely like stoned, nor did I have any amnesia. I don't know whether that was because it was a small dose or whether I'm resistant to sedatives, as I am to anesthetics.

[dreamshark.livejournal.com]

Well, according to the instructions, their normal modus operandi is to give you enough drugs that you aren't safe to drive for either "the rest of the day" or "24 hours" depending on which paragraph you believe. If nothing else, a full dose definitely should make you sleepy.

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

Yes, but both times I requested "very light sedation," so they didn't follow the normal procedure. I didn't have anything like a full dose, and wasn't sleepy. However, at least once for a past surgery there was some indication that I'm resistant to sedatives, and every experience with anesthesia of any kind (starting with ether when I was a little kid, whe they told my mother that they had to give me a dangerously high amount to get me under) has shown that I'm resistant to anesthesia.

Now that I've had both, if I have another endoscopy I'll request no sedation, and when (ugh) I have another colonoscopy I'll probably do the same as this time--wait to see how uncomfortable it gets--since my doctor is OK with these approaches.

[skylarker.livejournal.com]

The after-math dinner sounds like the best part of the whole deal. And I hope the test results are good ones.

[dreamshark.livejournal.com]

Oh yeah, results were fine. "See you in 10 years" means "we didn't find any polyps." It was just a routine screening, so I wasn't especially worried.

[jiawen]

I haven't had the pleasure of getting one myself, but I've seen about a half-dozen colonoscopies now. They are, indeed, quite interesting. The inside of the colon is a fairly interesting place. I'm always playing "guess that bodily fluid" with myself when I watch them. :) And I've had at least one patient who maintained that nothing had happened; upon waking up, they thought the doctor had just knocked them out and then revived them, without doing the procedure.

And I've definitely seen some of the annoyances that colonoscopies cause: drinking horrible stuff, being hungry, getting stuck with far too many needles, feeling embarrassed at having to fart afterwards, etc. And, I'm sure, one day I'll get to put up with those annoyances myself.

[mmagidow.livejournal.com]

I made myself stay awake to watch the video. Fascinating! But it took me 8 years before I could eat calamari again.