Horror Show

(aka The Colonoscopy)

I am a horror movie junkie. I’ve been known to screen The Exorcist alone at midnight for purposes of relaxation. I even enjoy a good slasher film. You know, the kind where someone spends a long-tormented night crying and clawing for survival?

I lived something similar last week. I wasn’t fleeing a homicidal maniac wielding a machete. My circumstances were worse.

I was preparing for a colonoscopy. 

The Hot Urologist is adamant that we begin taking new and improved care of our health. To this end, he has scheduled us for extensive testing.  In the last year, I have been subjected to a VO2 max test, cardiac calcium score, and a full body MRI. He also insisted that we pay $400 million for a space-age blood test that can reveal the presence of yet-to-surface cancers lying dormant in our body.

I grew up with a physician father in the 1980s. My Dad signed our health forms at the kitchen counter and threw us some Tylenol if we got sick. Unless a bone was visibly protruding through my skin, I didn’t set foot in a doctor’s office.

The Hot Urologist is taking a far more aggressive approach to healthcare management.

I can’t say that I care for it. He scheduled us both for a colonoscopy and told me it was not up for discussion.  Jeez.

On the mandatory preparation day before the procedure, I followed the instructions to end all food intake. This would have been an excellent opportunity to surf the sofa and ride the wave of Netflix. Instead, I opted for a full day of activities, beginning with a 7 AM appointment with Mark, my personal trainer.

     I consulted my list of pre-colonoscopy approved consumables to see what would give me some energy and selected a full-sugar Coca Cola. Mark was unimpressed. “It’s this or Jello,” I said.

“Jello would have been better,” he snarked. 

     For the first twenty minutes, I was on fire from the sugar rush. I told Mark I felt ready to enter an Ironman competition. He remained silent. After another twenty minutes, my fire was extinguished. I employed some sophisticated stalling techniques to bail on the lunges and ab work. When the hour was up, I dragged myself to the kitchen to refuel.

Real food was not on the menu, so I scarfed down six cups of Jello. I considered a rest on the sofa, but there was a schedule to keep.

In my quest to make new friends and ingratiate myself in town, I had joined a women’s philanthropy group focused on supporting the local arts scene and social climbing. I had RSVP’d yes to a meeting before scheduling the colonoscopy. It felt gauche to renege.

On the drive over, I shoved fistfuls of Gummy Bears into my mouth, reminding myself of proper conversation topics and good posture. But hunger and fatigue were affecting my focus. During the meeting, I somehow agreed to attend a weekly Bible study and contribute two dishes to a forthcoming luncheon. I was not in control of myself. I drove home praying that I had made a positive impression and, more importantly, that I would be able to extricate myself from both commitments.

I made a short pitstop at home to ingest my first dose of something called Clean Pig. Clean Pig is not the name listed on the bottle. However, reading small print while standing at the intersection of nausea and starvation is difficult.

Clean Pig was labeled “cranberry flavored.” Unless they were referring to cranberries soaked in embalming fluid, this was in error.

I forced the liquid down and raced back to the car. With my mood and mental competence deteriorating, I struggled through two grocery stores, the post office, and FedEx. By the time I reached the drive-through at the dry cleaners, I was feeling woozy.

I made it home by 5 PM and flung myself onto the sofa. Things were not looking good, and I still needed to survive the night.

I teed up a string of murder shows from the DVR and cradled a bucket of Gatorade. Extreme and gnawing hunger would not allow me to enjoy the murder. I packed up and moved to the bedroom to find sleep. But the great unsettling in my lower abdominal region made this impossible. I migrated to the TV room in the basement and spent the next several hours communing with the ladies’ room.

Time was at a standstill. I was ravenous and irritable. I went to the kitchen and stomped around the pantry. The gummy bears were gone. I flung the refrigerator doors open and then slammed them shut.  I was out of Jello. I began to wonder if this how I would die. Starving and alone, crying on the kitchen floor.

Back in the basement I attempted to calm myself by queueing up a new horror movie, but I couldn’t focus. I was summoned to the ladies’ room with unreasonable frequency. It was a nightmare.

Forty years passed before it was 2 AM and time for my second dose of Clean Pig. The cranberry flavored embalming fluid tasted worse than before. Only by a miracle did I manage to keep my gag reflex in check.

Sometime between 4 AM and 6 AM I must have managed to fall asleep. When I came to, daylight was streaming through the plantation shudders. I was surprised and euphoric to still be among the living. 

Drained from hunger, insomnia, and colon cancelling, I was delivered to the procedure appointment a shell of my former self. “This isn’t that dramatic,” The Hot Urologist said en route.  I wanted to counter that he couldn’t possibly understand my plight as he was both nourished and rested, but I had lost the ability to speak out loud.

The rest is a blur until I regained consciousness in the passenger seat of the getaway car. My friend-turned-chauffer, Cara, said brightly, “Cat Cat! You’re alive!”  I stared at her. “Barely,” I whimpered.

Despite my weakened state, I demanded that she squire me immediately to the nearest Chik-Fil-A. I ordered a fried chicken sandwich with extra pickles, a large waffle fry, a large strawberry milkshake, and a large chocolate milkshake. “Do you really need two shakes?” Cara asked incredulously. “Hush,” I snapped. 

She deposited me and my buffet of saturated fat at the kitchen table. I inhaled the sandwich and fries and then staggered to the sofa. I needed to regain my strength and recover from the ghastly ordeal with my two mega milkshakes and a murder marathon.

I was slurping away when the Hot Urologist returned home. He began recounting a completely ridiculous tale of some melodramatic idiot who spent twenty-four hours whining over a very simple procedure.

“That’s pathetic,” I said. “What kind of procedure was it?”

He never answered, he just shook his head and left the room.