DJMillennium's blog: "My Adventure!!!!!"

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.  (Fo 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  space-shuttle launch? This is pretty much the  Movi Prep 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  puton 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 is, 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 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.

On the subject of Colonoscopies.  Colonoscopies are no joke, 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?'

         12. 'God, now I know why I am not  gay.'

         And the best one of  all.

        
              13. 'Could you write a note for my wife saying that  my

        head is not up  there?'