HAVING A COLOSCOPY DONE TOMORROW 6/17/2013/OT

[Annie]

Hi  all  in case you don't  see me on the board here .   I will be  having a colonscopy  done since
being  in my 50's .  Which  is  very  important.   My test  is in the morning around 8:15am.
Will  try  to get on here  to let you know how i made out.
              Love  And  Prayers  Anne   

[michael c]

good luck annie, it's important...


I rarely share personal details here but two weeks ago I was hospitalized because I have diverticulitis that had become abscessed and grossly infected. without trying to sound overly dramatic if it hadn't been caught and had perforated I could have gone into toxic shock and even died. it was very serious and i'm still in the recovery process.


so best wishes.

[Bob_the_Bartender]

Annie,

You'll be fine, believe me.  As a "veteran" of the "beloved" colonoscopy procedure, let me assure you that the actual medical test is nothing to sweat about.  In fact, the doctors will be you giving that same medicine that Michael Jackson's doctor used to give him to sleep every night.  My doctor told me that I wouldn't even be aware of going off to dreamland once they injected the medicine into me.

And, he was absolutely correct; I just remembered waking up after the roughly 20 minute procedure.  You literally have no recollection at all of going off to sleep.  After a few minutes, the nurses will give you something like orange juice and crackers or pretzels, since you have not eaten anything solid (except for possibly jello and broth) since probably eight o'clock the previous evening (tonight).

The only unpleasant aspect of the test is the medicine your doctor probably gave you to drink tonight.  I was supposed to drink two bottles of the stuff combined with a lot of water.  The stuff was so unpleasant that I was only able to make it through one bottle of the awful stuff, and my test still went perfectly.  My own family physician related to me that even he was able to make it through only one bottle of that stuff when he had his colonoscopy.

One suggestion on how to drink that liquid is to use a straw so that you do not get the total "flavor" of the stuff.  Yuch!  (Don't expect to get too much sleep tonight.  You'll probably be making frequent trips to the "water closet.")

One you get home tomorrow, you'll probably want to chow down heavily.  I know that I really pigged out after coming home from the procedure: pizza, sandwiches, apples, cake, ice cream, you name it.  You'll probably be even hungrier than Prof. T. Elliott Stokes was after one of his famous three hour lectures at his university.

You'll be fine tomorrow.

Take care, your Dark Shadows buddy/cousin,

Bob
   

PS You used to be able to drive yourself to and from the test, but today the doctors arrange to have you driven to and back home from the test if you do not have someone to drive you there and back.  It's because that so-called "Michael Jackson medicine" will leave you just a bit woozy after the test and they don't want you driving on the day of the test.   Relax and enjoy the ride!

[Uncle Roger]

Good luck, Annie!

[Annie]

Hi all   i just  got home  and everything went  well.  Thanks for the prayers  ..
                     Love  Anne   

[Gerard]

I'm so happy that everything went fine for you, Annie!  You're such a special person!

Gerard

[dom]

Very happy to hear that everything is fine. hugz...

[MagnusTrask]

Glad it went well, Annie.   I've had that done too.   You are indeed very well knocked out, but I remember the coming-to being unnerving... don't know quite how to say it, but it was a bizarre feeling of abruptly regaining consciousness, while already sitting up, combined with a feeling that I may have in fact been conscious for some time, but had just suddenly "forgotten", that moment... like I'd just had a memory edit.

Steve Martin, Martin Short, and Tom Hanks all decided to go get colonoscopies together, and they made a sort of party out of it!

Michael, I've had diverticulitis too, that's the one operation I've had.  I'm glad they caught yours in time.  If I was that close to disaster, no one told me...

[Annie]

Hi  all  just thought  i'd  add  one more thing onto this message. The  doc's office called me on
Friday 6/22/2013  and said i had a benign  tumor somewhere in my colon area. ( Not sure)  don't
know if they removed it or not.   But  i do  have to go back in  August of this yr to see the doc,
                   Love  Anne

[Josette]

Hi Annie,

I'm sure it must have been removed.  If they find something like that I'm sure they automatically remove it.  And presumably the way they would know that it was benign would be from testing it afterwards.  I'm having mine done in about 3 1/2 weeks.

[Annie]

Just  wanted to correct something . I misunderstood the nurse at the doc.   She said it wasnt a tumor.
Something in the small  intestine of the illuim?    He just wants to keep watch  on it.
             Love  Anne

[Josette]

Since I mentioned that I was having a colonoscopy, too, I thought I'd post back that it was today.  She removed 3 small polyps and a lipoma, but while they are sent to biopsy, she assured me that there was nothing to be concerned about.

However, there was something funny I noticed the previous night.  I was looking back over all the pages of instructions they sent.  On the one from the hospital there was a blank at the top for them to fill in what procedure it referred to and they had written in the word "colon."  The night before I was reading it more carefully and discovered that it says:

Your Colon is scheduled in the GI Lab . . .   I laughed out loud and figured I'd be glad to send it to them.

[ProfStokes]

I'm glad everything went well for you both, Annie and Josette!

ProfStokes