My Colonoscopy Experience
-Well, the day is finally here, a day I’ve been dreading for weeks. It’s time to prepare for my colonoscopy, that I’m having tomorrow. I’ve watched my diet and have eaten canned pears twice a day for the last couple days with hopes of it helping. “I’m starved”, haven’t eaten anything except for a cinnamon roll, pears, coffee with creamer and 12 ounces of chicken broth since I woke up and it’s nearly 6 pm. I sure hope this solution I have to drink gets rid of the hunger pangs. (Yes, I quit being hungry) I’m having the test because there is a family history and I’m over 50. Both my dad and his sister had colon cancer, which was a contributing factor in both of their deaths. My dad was only 56 and I believe his sister was a bit younger than that. They both had other health related issues as well, so I have my hopes up, that they will not find anything I should be concerned about.
It’s 6 pm the day before my procedure, which is scheduled for 9 am and I’m about to begin drinking 64 ounces of the prep I was given. I have to drink the remaining 64 ounces, 4-5 hours before I’m suppose to leave for the hospital, which is pretty close by. Here goes nothing.
It’s not horrible, it’s not good either. My gag reflex will not let me down the entire 8 ounces. Going to try using a straw to see if that helps. It didn’t help much and holding my breath isn’t working either. It tastes rather salty to me and I’m not a big fan of salt. It’s taken me nearly 12 minutes to get the first glass down and I am suppose to drink one 8 ounce glass every 15 minutes. Going to be a long evening. As I work on this second glass, I have doubts I will be able to gag down 2 liters. If I’m having this much difficulty getting 16 ounces down, how on earth will I finish off 64 ounces. I guess I’ll just do my best and see how it goes.
Gagging Down Colonoscopy Prep
I don’t know if it’s allowed or not, but I have found that chewing some gum helps a lot. Doing it right before I have to drink and right after I take several drinks through the straw. I keep the prep solution away from the sides of my mouth with my tongue. It helps tremendously. The instructions say I can not eat or drink anything while I’m drinking the prep solution, so I’m spitting instead of swallowing. I chew the gum briefly and slide it all around in my mouth. I’ll swish a small amount of water around and spit it out. Gets that terrible taste out of my mouth and it’s kind of like starting fresh each time. Now the taste isn’t so horrible. It only becomes horrible when it begins to make me gag. My mouth is much happier, just couldn’t take the lingering taste. I was gagging just thinking about taking another drink. I’d try a mint if I had one. That might work too and would be easy to spit out without swallowing any mint. Just use it to cleanse the taste out of your mouth.
I Can Do This
I’m about a half hour behind the recommended time and only on my fourth glass. It’s going much better now, so I should not be much more than this thirty minutes behind when I finish this round. I hope there is a good movie on tonight when I have to get up at 5 am to start round two. My hospital actually has an app to guide you through the process of preparing for a colonoscopy
On Glass number 6 now and my hopes are higher than my doubts of getting through this first round…….I win, forty minutes behind, but finished. Not feeling the best, a little nauseated, on and off pains in my gut and quite sleepy. No results for all my hard work, but all in due time, I’m sure. Going to go and walk around a bit.
Everything seems to be fine now. I had some jello and a glass of white grape peach juice and I’m going to hit the hay. It’s 10 pm and I need to get back up at 6 am to complete the prep for my colonoscopy.
Round Two
Well, it’s 4 am and I have a headache, so drank 8 ounces of water. I’ll start drinking the prep in a half an hour. I see why you can not have any clear red liquids of any kind. I had lime jello before I went to bed last night. I had to have something I could chew or at least pretend to chew. Getting a pretty good clue that the prep has worked well. “I’m part martin…oh wait,….lime jello….whew”.
First glass down in three attempts, so better than last time. I have incentive of wanting a few minutes between glasses. Keeping the taste out of my mouth is such a relief. It’s now 5:09 and I’ve down 3, 8 ounce glasses so far. I’m a bit concerned about possibly not drinking enough water yesterday. I’m not a big water drinker and I had a lot of running around to do yesterday, so I only had 2 glasses and was suppose to have 8. I missed that part when I was reading my instructions for the colonoscopy procedure. I read them over again, this morning and found that part.
I have finished off 4, 8 ounce glasses now and doubt very much if I’ll be able to get past 6. I have been reading more information and believe 6 will be fine. Everything seems to be quite clear already. I found this information from UCLA health system, pdf, to be helpful as I prepared for my procedure. Judging by the indicator they use, to see if your ready for your colonoscopy or not, I’m ready. 🙂 I will drink my 6th glass, just for good measure. I just can not do more than that.
I’m feeling slightly feverish, but don’t believe I have a fever, can not really check it accurately either, while I’m drinking the prep. Just not feeling the best right now. My pain levels are quite high, still have a slight headache, nauseated and no energy at all. Debating if I want to take a shower or not, don’t feel like it. I know I should and I will, I just don’t want to. I always bathe before having anything done at the hospital. I worked as a supply tech at a couple different hospitals and believe the cleaner, the better, if at all possible.
It’s now 6:30 am and time to wake up the kids for school. I will drink a couple glasses of water and then lay down and rest for 45 minutes. I’ll get up throw myself in the shower, so I can get ready to leave and get it over with. Looks like I’ll have a bit of snow and the tail end of rush hour traffic to deal with, so I’ll have to leave a half hour before my appointment for an 11 mile trip, 9 of which are expressway.
It’s Time
I arrived at Ambulatory Surgery right at 9 am and was quickly registered and handed a beeper to notify me when it was time to go to pre-op. I didn’t even have enough time to finish a game of FreeCell before my pager sounded off. The nurse and I went over a few questions and details, then I used their bathroom and got my gown on. The IV therapist came in and quickly inserted a #20 into my wrist and I was set to go or so I thought. The nurse had a few monitoring patches to stick to me, for monitoring my vitals. Now I’m ready. I was in the procedure room by 10 am. I met my Doctor, a very nice woman with exceptional bedside manors. I didn’t realize I would be put out completely, but shortly after I was given something in my IV, I was waking up to, “your all done and your daughter is sitting right over there”. Was told the procedure went very well and they removed 2 polyps. One was 2mm in size and one was 15mm in size. I see my primary care doctor on the 1st of February to get my results.
As usual my heart rate was quite low and below 50, so the darn alarms kept me from sleeping at all, I just kept dozing off. I stayed in recovery for a while and they brought me a Pepsi to drink. It tasted so good, I can’t express how good it tasted to me at that time. I elected the wheelchair route to go to the car afterwards, just because I was feeling a bit shaky and off balance. With my neck condition, falling scares the crap outa me. I try to be very careful to avoid falls or sudden jerking. The trip home was pretty quick, traffic was good and roads were clear. Home again by 12:15, I made some ramen noodles, ate them, had a glass of water and went to bed and fell asleep. I didn’t wake up until about 4 pm.
I feel pretty darn good. I’m going to keep the diet a bit bland for a few days, just to promote healing where the polyps were removed during the colonoscopy. I read over my paperwork and it looks like they had a few issues navigating my colon. Unlike the drawing of a colon I used for this post, I have what is known as a tortuous or redundant colon. Seems mine is a bit longer than it should be, so it twists and turns more. The use of a pediatric endoscope and a bit of manual pressure to help it get around was needed.
I guess that’s it for now. I’ll finish this post up as soon as I get my results and hopefully I will not have to add future post about cancerous polyps and the journey involved with that.
The Results Are In
Good news, all is fine. The large polyp was classified as an Adenoma, which have been known to become cancerous. Mine thankfully had not. The other one was a hyperplastic polyp and they are totally benign. Nice to have the peace of mind, considering my family history, which also included my grandmother on my mother’s side. I had forgotten she had colon problems too. Preventative screening is a good thing and now they are saying it should be done sooner than 50 and I have to agree. Because of our family history, they suggested my children have a colonoscopy by age 40. It wasn’t a pleasant experience, but only the prep, everything else was a piece of cake.