Ah, who am I kidding; I'm about the least dignified blogger you'll read today.
So, about that procedure:
If you have seen the half century mark of life upon this planet, you are probably familiar with this scene..
...and, if you haven't yet reached that awesome milestone, let me break it down for you:
64 ounces of Gatorade + 238 grams of Miralax + 2 Dulcolax tablets = 12-16 hours of "cleansing", meant to prepare one's colon for a scoping. This is not to be confused with anal probing, as allegedly performed by little green men in spaceships, but, I have to assume that the two procedures are similar. Minus the "cleanse" part, I mean; to my knowledge, none of the survivors of alien abduction have reported completing a day-long fast with a Liquid Drano chaser prior to being swooped up in the beam of light, but, then again, I'm not privy to the classified documents stored at Area 51. Allegedly.
And, I digress.
So, here are the Cliff Notes of a colonoscopy:
3 days before the procedure, a diet of low-fiber, easily digestible foods is recommended. For me, that meant not eating any of the staples of my regular diet, including whole grains, vegetables, fruits, etc. Instead, I dined on low fat meats and random things made primarily from white flour and fat. This made me sluggish, hungry, cranky, and bloated. Things were already looking really great for this rite of passage, let me tell you.
1 day before the procedure, I was allowed only clear liquids, which, definitely put a crimp in my ability to participate in our company employee picnic, which, was being catered by one of my favorite Mexican restaurants. Boo.
Instead, I sipped on a sugar free vanilla Italian soda, which, wasn't too bad, but, wasn't a platter of sizzling hot chicken fajitas, either.
After drinking tea, Italian soda, and vegetable broth all day, I got to take two laxative tablets with a 32 ounce chaser of Miralax, dissolved in Gatorade. Folks, I don't even like Gatorade. Needless to say, choking that down was less than pleasant.
The laxatives kicked in about three hours later and I spent a lot of time "reading in the bathroom", if you get my drift, before finally calling it a night.
This morning, I got to finish off the last 32 ounce of Miralax Cocktail before driving to Neighboring City for the actual procedure, which, wasn't unpleasant at all, with the exception of the IV stick (rolling veins are my curse). The fact that I was unconscious for the entire thing may have had a little something to do with that. Ok, it had a lot to do with it.
The results of the scope were good; I had one tiny polyp that was removed and will be biopsied, but, according to the very nice (and, not bad looking) doctor, will probably prove to be nothing, given its size.
Currently, I am rehydrating and slowly reintroducing normal food back into my diet. Since there were no red flags identified during the scope, I am good to go for another 5-10 years before I have to repeat the nightmare cleanse or another anal probing.
Unless I am abducted by aliens, that is.
And, thus endeth my annual examinations. Thank heavens.
No comments:
Post a Comment