Update on my ills

I thought colonoscopies were always done knocked out. Why didn't they try that first time?

Because they're not always done knocked out here. I was offered morphine but honest to God I was more scared of being doped up than I was of a tube being shoved up my arse

I didn't think the tube up my arse would be that bad until they tried to do it and well, it was pretty bad.

The one down my throat went surprisingly well if you take out the few seconds going in and out when I couldn't breathe and wanted to vomit

I had gastroscopy about a year ago too - my throat hasn't been good for a couple of years, and the doctors I went to were pretty much clueless about it. Their best guess was GERD, so they had me go under gastroscopy, just to make sure that it's nothing worse than that.

There was no anesthetics in my case either. I had to lie down on my side on a table, they rolled up a screen roughly in front and above my head and told me to try and relax, because the procedure is easier and quicker that way. True as that was, it's still a tough job overpowering your reflexes and letting that tube go down your throat, but the second attempt was successful.

The procedure itself was OK. You can't really feel the tube going about your insides, but the air they keep pumping in you for easier process makes you do weird gurgling noises involuntarily. The nurses, as an attempt to distract me from the discomfort, cheerfully told me to look at the screen where my stomach was being examined at the time. I was still very conscious of the tube and all, but I had to admit that my stomach looks OK.

So it went well, all in all. Had heavily bloodshot eyes right after the procedure, which was pretty interesting.

best of luck, buddy. you'll be sound. i hope it somehow finalizes your being ill so you can get fixed up and on with your life. be sure to let us know how it goes.

Jesus... I just can't imagine that.

I had a barium rectal exam when I was thirteen because they thought I had appendicitis. The shoved a tube into my rectum, and filled it with a white substance called barium so they could take x-rays.

I cried.

I had a rectal exam once but it wasn't in a hospital and it wasn't performed by a doctor.

A bit of an update

It's next friday. I'll go to the hospital at noon, be gassed, injected and then probed. Out by dinner on the proviso that someone looks after me for the next twenty four hours

I can't eat any fibre at all for three days before this and on the Thursday night, the last time I can eat is 3pm. After that, starting at about 6pm I have to consume one large bag of industrial strength laxative every hour with a liter of water four times over before sleeping. I have the laxatives with me now. The whole aesthetic of the packaging is just so scarily impersonal.

Basically I'm terrified.

Find some suitable hypnosis files to turn this from phobia into fetish.

And he wonders why he has less clout here than he used to.

I have less clout? When did this happen?