The Colonoscopy Files Continued: Part III

Colonoscopy Day

Through some morbid urge I’d picked up Mary Roach’s book “Gulp”, a thoroughly delightful read about the digestive system, a few months before my colonoscopy. One of the passages that stood out was a description of, presumably, one of the first colonoscopies performed in France. During the procedure a gastroenterologist attempted to cauterize a polyp and inadvertently set off a pocket of flatus inside the patient’s colon.

“The explosion literally tore the patient in half” are the startled words of a firsthand account of the incident as noted by the author Roach, who goes on to mention that this is the reason why gastroenterologists pump the colon full of an inert gas. In addition to limiting the number of explosions in the operating room pumping the colon full of gas also “plumps” out the organ thereby making it easier to maneuver with a scope. Suffice it to say that I was more concerned about the aforementioned purpose of the gas than the latter given the procedure I was about to undergo. Sure it’s great and all if the gastroenterologist has an easier go of it but I like my body the way it is and not in two separate pieces.

Given the events of the evening and the resulting prep I was feeling pretty decent. I didn’t get a great night’s sleep as I had to wake up at 4:20 in the morning and spent the rest of the time stomping to the toilet every thirty minutes but I usually don’t sleep all that well anyway.

It was, all things considered, a beautiful day for a colonoscopy but, then again it would have been a beautiful day to do just about anything. The temperature was 73, humidity was low, and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. My only regret was that I was going to spend the day recovering from the procedure instead of thinking about going on a walk or working in the yard or one of the many other activities I like to consider performing during pleasant weather but never actually get around to.

“We should do things like this more often,” I said to my wife as she drove me to my appointment. She gave me a confused look and then continued driving, assuming that my uncharacteristically pleasant demeanor was due to a lack of nutrition instead of any genuine desire to have a colonoscopy on a regular basis.

We rolled into the clinic at precisely 9:30 where I checked in and was asked to provide a drivers license as well as proof of insurance to the staff at the clinic. Both cards were promptly handed back to me which I then handed to my wife and promptly forgot about until two weeks later when she found them in her purse.

After a half an hour in the waiting room I was taken to Pre-Op and instructed to strip down and put on standard issue hospital robe after a tech took my blood pressure and heart rate. The room was a bit chilly but the staff had thoughtfully provided us all with warmed blankets and I found myself dozing off to sleep. I can’t say that a pre-op room in a clinic is the best place for a nap but, then again, I’ve fallen asleep in worse places.

A bit later a nurse installed my IV and an anesthesiologist asked if I had any questions. I briefly considered inquiring about his thoughts on leveraged buyouts but decided that, perhaps, pissing off someone integral to the procedure wouldn’t be the wisest thing I could do at the moment.

The room I found myself in also held a number of other patients and we were all separated by nothing more than a set of curtains for the barest amount of privacy. The upshot was that I could hear just about everything that was going on within a thirty foot radius and, as there wasn’t much else to do, I did a bit of eavesdropping. The staff was debating about what they were going to have for lunch that day. The older gentlemen in the stall next to me was mumbling about whether his daughter was going to remember to pick him up. The techs were complaining about the operating system on their laptops that, apparently, kept crashing. At some point I heard a voice ask “are you in yet?” which I’d assumed was a reference to an IT concern and not one that was colonoscopic nature.

I wasn’t given much time to brood over my concerns be they procedural or IT related before I was rolled into surgery or whatever the room is called that I was wheeled in to. I was introduced to more staff members whose names and functions I promptly forgot. The gastroenterologist asked if I had any questions and I refrained from making any inquiries about his thoughts on leveraged buyouts. Everything seemed to be going according to plan until I noticed the one person in the room to whom I hadn’t been introduced. Upon seeing him it was hard to figure how I hadn’t noticed his presence before as he was approximately the size and shape of a large chest of drawers.

“What’s your job here?” I asked as pleasantly as possible.

“I assist,” was his curt response in an Eastern European accent, “now please roll over,” he finished and gestured at me with a hand the size of a ham.

The word “please” sounded unfamiliar in his mouth and, without wanting to irritate him further, I rolled over and was greeted by the assistant anesthesiologist.

“Just let me know if you have any questions,” Jeff of Todd or Bill said shortly before dosing me up with anesthetic. I’ve never been good at names so I can’t quite recall what his might have been but I did wonder why I was getting an assistant rather than the real deal. Before I could ask, however, I was out.

Some time later I came to consciousness in Post Op. I couldn’t say precisely how much later because I didn’t have a watch or a phone. I was also so looped that even if I’d had a watch or a phone there’s a good chance I wouldn’t have been able to tell what time it was in the first place. According to my notes the entire process took 2 hours and 10 minutes from check in to the time I left the clinic. Unfortunately I don’t remember making the note. It turns out I didn’t remember quite a lot of other things as well.

I was to learn later that I kept trying to wake up during the procedure and, as such, the anesthesiologist’s assistant had to keep putting me back under which required an additional dose or two of anesthetic. The end result felt a lot like being on back end of a few Long Island Iced Teas after smoking a sizable joint.

Upon standing I found that I had some difficulty staying on two legs which made getting dressed a bit of an issue. According to my wife I was also quite talkative while I attempted to put on my clothes and asked about the condition of the cilia in my colon which amused everyone to no end. I also, apparently, tried to convince everyone that I could drive if I had some time to down a cup of coffee. Shortly after that I asked for a beer.

It is this altered state that most people encounter after coming to consciousness from a colonoscopy. Some find it pleasant. I did not. I felt reasonably sober but I was clearly looped out of my mind. This, by the way, is the reason why patients are required to bring along someone to drive them home after the procedure. If the patient were left to his or her own devices the clinic parking lot would look like the end of a monster truck rally thereby bringing an entirely new level of stress to a necessary but somewhat unpleasant procedure. Liability also probably has something to do with the need for a driver as well.

By the time I got home I thought it might be a good idea to eat something. Just exactly what that might have been I have no idea. I do recall spending about thirty minutes scrolling through the guide on the TV while I ate whatever it was I had for lunch. At some point I realized that I was just mindlessly looking over the same thirty or forty channels because I couldn’t remember the names of the shows I’d seen before scrolling through the guide again because I’d forgotten that I’d forgotten about scrolling though the guide in the first place.

I spent another thirty minutes or so staring vacantly at the TV before I decided that it might be time for a nap and headed off to count sheep for a couple of hours. When I woke it was time for dinner and I ate half of an entire extra large pizza before going right back to bed. I did not, per my doctor’s orders, have a beer.

The next day I had the presence of mind to ask my wife if the gastroenterologist had found any polyps and found, to my relief, that he had not. All in all I found the procedure to be a mild inconvenience. The prep wasn’t the most fun I’ve ever had but it wasn’t intolerable and I even lost a few pounds in the bargain. My biggest question about the entire procedure was what purpose the man the size of a piece of large furniture was supposed to serve. A part of me hopes I never have to find out.

To read the first portion of The Colonoscopy Files: Part 1 (What Goes in Must Come Out) just click here!

About the Author

derekbremer Prior to his life as a stay at home father Derek spent more than a decade performing public relations and marketing functions for financial consulting firms and found the job to be precisely as exciting as it sounds. When not tending to his wife or daughter Derek enjoys subjecting the public to his unique take on fatherhood, travel and animal husbandry. He has been published in Scary Mommy, Sammiches and Psych Meds, The Good Men Project, HowToBeADad, Red Tricycle, RAZED, HPP and the Anthology "It's Really Ten Months Special Delivery: A Collection of Stories from Girth to Birth.