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I know I've hit this topic before, but just having had my second one this morning I felt compelled to delve into it again, so I apologize for any redundancies from my first post. FYI: I didn't actually have two this morning - I had the first one last year. I'm not that masochistic. As before, most of the focus will not be on the procedure, which is really nothing, but will be on the night before, which is really something. Let's start with...
SUPPLIES
Seating: You may think you need (and will want) to sit on the toilet the whole time, but you can't (see Odor Treatment below). However, you should be within about 5 seconds of being able to get your ass on that seat. I am NOT kidding about this part. You go from mild gut discomfort to DEFCON 4 in about 3 seconds. Do whatever you can to shorten the trip. Clear a path. Warn fellow home-dwellers not to be in the path. Wear sneakers. Leave the toilet lid up. Hell, remove it, since you'll want to replace the entire toilet after this experience, anyway. You may believe you can hold on until you get yourself on the toilet, but please listen to me: YOU CAN'T. I don't care if you can crack walnuts with your anal sphincter - there is none strong enough to hold back the surge you'll experience. It's like trying to stave off a tsunami with a cotton ball.
Ice cream: Several gallons will be desired. It doesn't matter what flavor. Or brand. It doesn't matter if you're lactose-intolerant. It's not for your mouth. You figure it out.
Reading Material: Make sure your Kindle's all charged up. Binge-watch Netflix on your tablet. Buy a copy of War and Peace (trust me, you'll have the time).
Odor Treatment: Purchase at least 100 cans of Febreeze. Burn candles. Buy your family gas masks. Hang several dozen car fresheners in your bathroom. If you're even moderately friendly with your next door neighbors, advise them that they might be better off checking into a hotel.
Music: Like the Febreeze, this is not so much for you, but for anyone unlucky enough to be living with you for these 6 hours. Nobody wants to hear what you're doing in there. Turn it up.
Ear Plugs: The noises coming out of you are not fit for human ears, even though they're your noises. The music is for others; these are for you. When you're in turbo-thrust mode, you'll thank me for this.
Toilets: If you live with at least one other person, you should not attempt this if you only have one toilet in your home, because, for several hours, that toilet will be YOURS. You will need it the most, plus, no one else will want to use it (trust me, they won't even want to enter the room after your first episode) until it's been cleaned, preferably with bleach and napalm. Or replaced, as mentioned above.
TIMEFRAME
0 Hour: This is where it begins. Last chance to turn back. Although, truth be told, if you plan on keeping your colonoscopy appointment tomorrow, it will make things MUCH less unpleasant for a number of people; people who have access to medical equipment while you are sedated. You'll never be able to prove a thing. If you use the prescription, it's only super-unpleasant for you. You must drink 6 ounces of SuPrep Bowel Preparation, a nuclear-level laxative that will soon become apparent has been formulated by a terrorist organization. It actually doesn't really taste or smell all that bad, either. I imagine this is what a cocktail of anti-freeze, ammonia, Gatorade and kangaroo urine would taste like - fruity, with an oaky undertone. Doesn't matter - you'll definitely regret ingesting it later. It's like Tequila that way. By the way, you have to add 10 ounces of water to the 6 ounces of SuPrep and down it all, then drink another two 16-ounce containers of water within the next hour. That's 48 ounces in a 1-hour time frame. This allows the Medi-Prep to flush everything from your GI system, without also removing your internal organs, which is probably a good thing. By the way, if you're like me, you'll be tempted to check, when this stuff starts to work, that you HAVEN'T actually passed an organ. Don't. Please resist the urge to sneak a peek, unless you're still looking for that marble you swallowed when you were 5 - this stuff will certainly encourage it to vacate your GI tract.
1-3 Hours: SuPrep is typically a two-stage preparation to be employed the night before your procedure; you do the first dose @ 5PM and the second at @ 9PM - double the fun!! Depending on your physiology, your diet and some other factors, you may or may not start what can rightfully be described as "evacuation" during this stage. You will experience rumblings in your GI tract, and by rumblings, I mean it will feel like a miniature armored Army division is making an incursion to your rectum. Consider that it normally takes anywhere from 36 to 60 hours for food to transit from the mouth to the anus. Now consider that this stuff will transit that same distance in, at most, a few hours - this should give you an idea of how volatile this solution is. We must never allow this to land in the hands of America's enemies. Indeed, let's just stop all the air strikes on ISIS/ISIL and spike their water with this; their threat will be eliminated in a day or two, as they beg of for toilet paper (think how much sand is out there). This is when you'll be happy you followed my directions for a clear, short, unimpeded path to the bathroom.
4-6 Hours: This stage is the equivalent of the sequel for most modern movies; generally much, much more horrible than the original. This is when you start to make the comparison to that time you had food poisoning. Now take that experience, multiply it by 10, throw in a full pack of Ex-Lax and a healthy dose of dysentery, and you'll come close to the atomic squirts you are now praying to whatever deity you believe in to please, please end.
Sometime after retiring for the night: You may believe, and have copious evidence to support that belief, that nothing else could possibly be left inside of you to be evacuated. In fact, you're probably, as I was, under the impression that food that I would eat in the future had also been eliminated. This is a self-delusion. You will wake up, suddenly, in the middle of the night, in a panic, hoping you can get to the one place you would have hoped you would not see for at least another 24 hours (or until your butt has healed) before you explode one last time. Next time I may just sleep in the bathroom.
Morning of the procedure: Congratulations! You've made it! And just when you thought NOTHING could possibly still be in your GI tract, you will go again before your trip to the hospital, then again once more just before the procedure itself. Once I was under, what happened after that could hardly be considered my fault, but I would like to formally apologize to all those in the procedure room for the inevitable last gasp that I'm sure occurred, and hope that they can forgive me. After they disinfect the room. With napalm. Peace.
