A Public Service Announcement from My Butthole

“You using the whole fist doc”?

—Fletch

Some time ago I was told a joke—the gist of it was, who was the boss of the body.

According to the joke, the contenders were your brain, your heart, your lungs, your kidneys, your liver, and sitting silently off to the side of some body cavity or another, your anus. The center of the joke was an argument between the various contenders who had decided collectively that there was far too much democratic equality going on inside you, and that each one had decided to assert themselves as head of (the) state (of your body).

The root cause of the conflict was all the impasses and needed compromise such an equality of voice can induce, and so it was decided that an omnipotent leader would help move things along more efficiently.

The bulk of the joke-telling was the case each contender made for why they should be boss as opposed to any of the others. They were all very confident in their own merits, and equally confident in the disparaging of the others’ qualifications. There was much back and forth with lots of sarcasm, insulting, exaggerating, lying, yelling, and, in general, downright rudeness. I know— that sounds a lot like our United States government in action and maybe the whole intent of the joke was that very metaphor—but I missed it at the time.

Anyway, none of them could come to an agreement, and just as the whole thing was about to “come to blows” your anus, who had until then been silent, announced quietly, but firmly, “I am the boss of this body.”

Everyone laughed, and the ridicule was merciless.

“What a dumbass,” your heart chortled.

“YOU WOULDN’T KNOW YOUR ASS FROM A HOLE IN THE GROUND!” your brain shouted through the guffaws.

Many more insults followed, and your anus left the cavity silently, and returned to its place. The other contenders were so overwhelmed by their mirth that they forgot about the argument entirely and after expending all the cruel laughter and ridicule aimed at your anus that they could muster, they returned to their respective places in your body as well.

So, this turned out to be a long-assed joke, and I am tiring of it, so I will cut to the chase: your anus squeezed your sphincter shut, and “you know what” backed up and into all the other parts of your body. After much posturing all the contenders were forced to concede that your anus was indeed the boss.

On the face of it this whole tale seems to not fit into the funny “ha ha” joke genre, but the person who told it had a way of making such things into something humorous and so you’ll just have to take my word for it that at the time of the joke’s telling I laughed politely.

As for the various real-world comparisons, make of them what you will, but yesterday I was thinking of the joke, literally, when I was wheeled into the operating room for my very first colonoscopy.

—

I was apprehensive about getting a colonoscopy. I have been avoiding it for years. I did the alternative mail the “thing in a bag” option a couple of times and felt good enough about it, but during a recent doctor visit my physician stressed yet again that the only way to be truly safe was the procedure— and she assured me that the main advantage was, if anything were found it could be dealt with then and there without developing into something more serious.

Also, I have a couple of friends who are suffering greatly because of advanced colon issues that through inattention had been allowed to become incurable, and I also know a few people that got colonoscopies and preached, heavily, how happy they are that they did.

Everyone who got the procedure promised me that it was painless and the actual examination was effortless mentally and physically because when they start probing, you’re already knocked out cold from a powerful anesthetic. One punster, my neighbor Jake, described the whole shebang as “a pain in the ass,” yet easy peazy.

The worst part, everyone agreed, was the preparation that started three days before.

It starts with restricting your diet to soft, mushy things, they said, and starting two days before you go on a liquids-only regimen. Then, the day before you drink “clear liquids” until 4 PM, and then it gets heavy. Starting at four, you start drinking eight ounces every 15 minutes for two hours of a premixed Gatorade/MiraLAX mixture—64 ounces of (any color but red) Gatorade and a whole bottle of MiraLAX. That one is relatively painless to gulp down, but I will say this: I don’t get constipated often, but I never will again. I have always followed the directions on the bottle and kept to a sissified cap of laxative, but fuck that going forward.

Guzzle a whole bottle and I don’t care who you are—you’re firing out with prejudice within minutes.

—

So, yesterday I went for it. I followed the directions explicitly, including drinking the only unpleasant thing, a magnesium citrate drink, at three AM the day of the procedure. That one was the coup de gras, in that it caused the last, final bit of toilet sitting.

My procedure was scheduled for some time around eight AM, and my prep started at 6:45. There was zero pain involved, and the IV insertion was even relatively painless, and I fucking hate needles.

There was a bit of waiting around after that, but the perky nurses made it an easy wait. The anesthesiologist came in and said some stuff, but I was too nervous to listen, and the doctor who was going to perform the procedure came in and said some stuff, but I was too nervous to listen to her either.

Then, a different nurse wheeled me into the operating room where the O.R. nurses couldn’t have been more pleasant. They were actually downright cheerful, and I guess they settled me down enough that when I glanced over at my vitals on the computer screen, my blood pressure was 132/70 and my heart rate was 60 bpm.

Dang, I thought. I wish I could hit those numbers on an average day.

After some fussing, the head O.R. nurse told me she would be asking me questions but not to worry about them, and then she plugged a small tube into my IV and that was all she wrote. Lights out.

—

I woke up an indeterminate amount of time later, and for a few minutes I was seriously groggy. My first thought was regarding how impressed I was with the anesthetic—propofol, which conked me out in less than three seconds, and was equally efficient to come out of. I wouldn’t want to make a habit of it, but boy did I rest easy considering what was going on while I was out.

A few minutes or so after I was able to keep my eyes open the doctor came in and I decided to make a joke out of the anesthesia experience—telling the doctor that I wanted it officially noted in my chart that when I went to hospice I wanted nothing but propofol—no pussy morphine drip for me. She frowned, not at all amused, and asked if I wanted to end up like the star entertainer blankety blank… She then said in an equally serious tone that I would need to address my wish in a living will. I realized that either my doctor lacked a sense of humor, or my anesthesia-addled sense of humor lacked the humor component.

Either way we moved on, and my doctor’s demeanor changed completely.

“Everything went great,” my doctor announced almost gleefully. “You had four small polyps, which I removed, and some diverticula and a few non-bleeding hemorrhoids.”

I flinched at the hemorrhoid thing, and I told her I didn’t know what a diverticula was—so she said that the hemorrhoids were super common and diverticula is a small divot or pocket in the lining of my colon. All in all, she said I was in really great shape, colon-wise, and that four little polyps from a first time colonoscopist (she didn’t actually say that word—I just made it up) was almost remarkable. She said I had nothing to worry about going forward, and that she would like to see me again in three years.

Ten minutes after that I pulled my clothes back on and my neighbor Jake and I headed out of the hospital and straight to the bar.

I did NOT drink any alcohol, but I did scarf down a big hunk of walleye and a green salad, and I drank thirty-seven, or maybe it was thirty-eight iced teas—so hungry and thirsty was I from the pre-op liquid and laxative extravaganza….

After that I got dropped off at home and I chilled the rest of the day in my easy chair, surprisingly clear-headed and filled with warmth and comfort at the notion that my colon was very nearly fresh as a daisy!

All in all, I felt pretty good about myself.

Public Service Announcement

Far be it from me to preach, especially since no one I know has befouled their earthly vessel more than I have. Also, I’m right in the running for the National Champion Dumbass Who Ignores Their Doctor award. It would be hypocritical for me to get all health nutty at this stage of my self-destructive journey and come off like anyone should listen to a word I have to say regarding taking good care of oneself, especially as it relates to preventative care in action.

Therefore, take it with a grain of salt, but my advice to anyone over 50 years old who has never gotten a colonoscopy—go ahead and do it. One way or the other, you’ll be glad you did.

However: them saying you won’t feel anything at all is a lie. As I woke up from the propofol-fueled magic carpet ride, the first thing I became aware of was a peculiar, indescribable but noticeable tingling from my butthole. It was weird. Unnerving even.

But I soon got over it.

[Author’s Confession: After going through the colonoscopy procedure and then reading the medical evaluation/findings document, in the following paragraphs I was going to explain what I learned and experienced in gory detail, and along the way, I was going to include several infantile metaphors and immature word play alterations that at first thought, I found amusing. One example would be— the doctor called it a “digital rectal examination,” and I was going to change it to “Someone shoved their finger up my butt.”

Essentially, we are talking ass jokes and toilet humor.

But then I thought to myself, Self, would I want to read a bunch of gross stuff about someone else’s guts and ass that was firmly embedded in childish vernacular? My answer was a firm no.]

On the other hand, knowledge is power, and knowing that my colon is a lean, clean, squeezing machine is a wonderful thing!

Still, nothing else is going up there unless I decide to pucker up and go in for a prostate exam.

Clean as a whistle!