This is from newshound Dave Barry's colonoscopy journal:
I called my friend Andy Sable, 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 intothe 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 thos
e 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 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 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, but these
comments during the exam were quite humorous..... A physician claimed
that
the following are actual comments made by his patients=2
0(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?"
I called my friend Andy Sable, 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 intothe 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 thos
e 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 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 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, but these
comments during the exam were quite humorous..... A physician claimed
that
the following are actual comments made by his patients=2
0(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?"
