Please forgive me....

[Guest guest]

I am in no way trying to make light of this horrible illness or any of the

problems associated with it. My husband (UC 7 years, mostly SCD 1 year) just

forwarded me a humorous column from Dave Barry regarding colonoscopies. I

haven't a clue how old it is, but we live outside the US and haven't been able

to read Dave in several years. The quotes at the very bottom are priceless. I

hope you laugh as hard as we did...

Amelia

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Dave Barry's Colonoscopy Journal

I called my friend Andy Sable, a gastroenterologist, to make an

appointment for a colonoscopy.

A few days later, in his office, Andy showed me a color diagram of the

colon, a lengthy organ that appears to go all over the place, at one

point passing briefly through Minneapolis .

Then Andy explained the colonoscopy procedure to me in a thorough,

reassuring and patient manner.

I nodded thoughtfully, but I didn't really hear anything he said,

because my brain was shrieking, quote, `HE'S GOING TO STICK A TUBE

17,000 FEET UP YOUR BEHIND!'

I left Andy's office with some written instructions, and a

prescription for a product called `MoviPrep,' which comes in a box

large enough to hold a microwave oven.

I will discuss MoviPrep in detail later; for now suffice it to say

that we must never allow it to fall into the hands of America's

enemies.

I spent the next several days productively sitting around being nervous.

Then, on the day before my colonoscopy, I began my preparation.

In accordance with my instructions, I didn't eat any solid food that

day; all I had was chicken broth, which is basically water, only with

less flavor.

Then, in the evening , I took the MoviPrep. You mix two packets of

powder together in a one-liter plastic jug, then you fill it with

lukewarm water. (For those unfamiliar with the metric system, a liter

is about 32 gallons). Then you have to drink the whole jug. This

takes about an hour, because MoviPrep tastes - and here I am being

kind - like a mixture of goat spit and urinal cleanser, with just a

hint of lemon.

The instructions for MoviPrep, clearly written by somebody with a

great sense of humor, state that after you drink it, `a loose, watery

bowel movement may result'.

This is kind of like saying that after you jump off your roof, you may

experience contact with the ground.

MoviPrep is a nuclear laxative. I don't want to be too graphic, here,

but: have you ever seen a space-shuttle launch? This is pretty much

the MoviPrep experience, with you as the shuttle. There are times

when you wish the commode had a seat belt. You spend several hours

pretty much confined to the bathroom, spurting violently. You

eliminate everything. And then, when you figure you must be totally

empty, you have to drink another liter of MoviPrep, at which point, as

far as I can tell, your bowels travel into the future and start

eliminating food that you have not even eaten yet.

After an action-packed evening, I finally got to sleep.

The next morning my wife drove me to the clinic. I was very nervous.

Not only was I worried about the procedure, but I had been

experiencing occasional return bouts of MoviPrep spurtage. I was

thinking, `What if I spurt on Andy?' How do you apologize to a friend

for something like that? Flowers would not be enough.

At the clinic I had to sign many forms acknowledging that I understood

and totally agreed with whatever the heck the forms said. Then they

led me to a room full of other colonoscopy people, where I went inside

a little curtained space and took off my clothes and put on one of

those hospital garments designed by sadist perverts; the kind that,

when you put it on, makes you feel even more naked than when you are

actually naked.

Then a nurse named Eddie put a little needle in a vein in my left

hand. Ordinarily I would have fainted, but Eddie was very good, and I

was already lying down. Eddie also told me that some people put vodka

in their MoviPrep.

At first I was ticked off that I hadn't thought of this, but then I

pondered what would happen if you got yourself too tipsy to make it to

the bathroom, so you were staggering around in full Fire Hose Mode.

You would have no choice but to burn your house.

When everything was ready, Eddie wheeled me into the procedure room,

where Andy was waiting with a nurse and an anesthesiologist I did not

see the 17,000-foot tube, but I knew Andy had it hidden around there

somewhere. I was seriously nervous at this point.

Andy had me roll over on my left side, and the anesthesiologist began

hooking something up to the needle in my hand.

There was music playing in the room, and I realized that the song was

`Dancing Queen' by ABBA. I remarked to Andy that, of all the songs

that could be playing during this particular procedure, `Dancing

Queen' had to be the least appropriate.

`You want me to turn it up?' said Andy, from somewhere behind me.

`Ha ha,' I said. And then it was time; the moment I had been dreading

for more than a decade. If you are squeamish, prepare yourself,

because I am going to tell you, in explicit detail, exactly what it

was like.

I have no idea! Really! I slept through it! One moment, ABBA was

yelling, `Dancing Queen, feel the beat of the tambourine,' and the

next moment, I was back in the other room, waking up in a very mellow

mood.

Andy was looking down at me and asking me how I felt. I felt

excellent. I felt even more excellent when Andy told me that It was

all over, and that my colon had passed with flying colors. I have

never been prouder of an internal organ.

ABOUT THE WRITER

Dave Barry is a Pulitzer Prize-winning humor columnist for the Miami Herald.

On the subject of Colonoscopies…

Colonoscopies are no joke and you'd better be trotting yourself into

the doctor's office for your check up after age 50 too!, but these

comments during the exam were quite humorous. A physician claimed that

the following are actual comments made by his patients (predominately

male) while he was performing their colonoscopies:

1. `Take it easy, Doc. You're boldly going where no man has gone before!'

2. `Find Amelia Earhart yet?'

3. `Can you hear me NOW?'

4. `Are we there yet? Are we there yet? Are we there yet?'

5. `You know, in Arkansas, we're now legally married.'

6. `Any sign of the trapped miners, Chief?'

7. `You put your left hand in, you take your left hand out…'

8. `Hey! Now I know how a Muppet feels!'

9. `If your hand doesn't fit, you must quit!'

10. `Hey Doc, let me know if you find my dignity.'

11. `You used to be an executive at Enron, didn't you?'

And the best one of all.

12. `Could you write a note for my wife saying that my head is not up there?'