:oscopy

Get it?  😕  Colon.  Oscopy.

I was really hoping to find some humor in this procedure.  This was my first colonoscopy.  Welcome to being 50!  It is like a right of passage.  I have read many stories over the years about this procedure.  Most of the horror surrounds “the prep,” which is a nice way of saying that Satan is coming down your colon with a supersoaker from hell.  And while that was mostly true, it was not as bad as I was expecting.

Granted, having to stay within 30 feet of the toilet for most of the night was not pleasant.  The time actually spent on the toilet was not pleasant.  I did get to play a lot of games on my iPad, so it wasn’t a total loss.

Here I sit and dream of glory, alone inside the lavatory.  (An obscure reference–leave me a comment if you know the source.)

Personally, I thought that drinking “the prep,” a concoction called Suprep that comes in two 6 ounce bottles of cherry flavored hell, was actually worse than getting rid of it.  I’m not a big fan of cherry to begin with, and that is probably a good thing.  My dad underwent a colonoscopy a number of years ago.  He mixed his prep at that time with Squirt, a citrus soda.  From that day on until the day he died, he could not bring himself to drink Squirt again.  And that name is kind of ironic, doncha think?

So if taking this prep turns me from cherry flavored anything, it is certainly not the end of the world.

It looks so innocent!

And it was god awful.

Yeah, there was cherry.  With bitter undertones and a hint of maybe seltzer–or mineral water.  I think I detected some acetone or benzene, if my senses have not failed me from biochemistry.  The bouquet was nonexistent–it didn’t even smell like cherries.  And it was crystal clear, so you could almost convince yourself you were drinking water or vodka, until it actually touched a single taste bud on your tongue.

You see, you had to dilute this wonderful prep into 16 ounces of clear but vile crap that you must choke down before you have to run to the bathroom.  Twenty minutes.  That’s all it took.  And I had to down two more 16 ounce cups of water afterwards, or it would have sucked the water out of my brain.  I would have ended up a pile of dust floating in the toilet.  The beast had to be fed water.

So after choking down the cherry shit, alternating forced gulps with some coffee or white grape juice (you can’t drink anything with red or purple dye!) to try and save my taste buds, I then had to down 32 ounces of water over the next hour.  I’m not sure I drink that much water in a single day!  I drink–coffee, tea, soft drinks, wine, beer.  But only occasionally do I ever drink plain old water.

The first bottle came out explosively but without any accidents I am happy to report.  I did get baby wipes as recommended since toilet paper could be “irritating.”  By the time I was ready for bed, I was no longer living on the seat.

Unfortunately, bottle two had to be taken seven hours before my scheduled time, with another 32 ounces of water in the hour after that.  Then, no more liquids until after the procedure.  With a 9:00 appointment, I had to get up at 2:00 am to force another cherry jubilee down my esophagus, and through my intestines.

I was hoping that being half asleep, I wouldn’t mind the cherry crap so much.  I was wrong.  It was worse.  I have never drank gasoline, but if you throw some cherries in it, I imagine this is how it would taste.

Boom!  I’m back in the bathroom.  Cholera without the actual disease.

In the morning, I looked longingly at half a cup of coffee left over from the previous night’s escapades.  I carefully took a mouthful, swished it around my mouth to tantalize my taste buds and maybe absorb some through my mouth’s mucosa, before spitting it out in the sink.  I watched as the coffee went down the drain.  I was devastated.  But I didn’t drink anything!  I did not swallow!  (That’s what she said!)

So I arrive at 8:45, and I am back in the holding area with all my clothes off except for my socks, a hospital gown and a sheet to keep the young women from laughing at me, or at least, not laughing at that.  At 11:00 o’clock, they finally come to take me for the procedure.  Waiting that long was more irritating than the toilet paper.  And I’m a doctor!  There had better have been an exploding colon somewhere to delay me getting my damned coffee.

Anyway, I’m all ready to take notes about the actual procedure for this blog, to bring the colonoscopy experience alive for my readers my reader  the person who stumbled here by accident.  They ask me to lay on my left side.  And  . . .

Then I woke up.

What a disappointment!  This is the closest thing to a sexual encounter I’ve had in years and I missed it!

And in case you care, my colon is just fine, thank you very much.  Not even a polyp.  Come back in 10 years.

And I finally got my coffee.

Seriously . . .March is Colorectal Cancer Awareness Month.  And if you are over 50, don’t be like dead-from-colon-cancer Rob Lowe–get DirecTV and a colonoscopy today.