It wasn’t so bad after all

April 26th, 2011

The colonoscopy and gastroscopy

I would say the absolute worse thing about prepping for a colonoscopy is the starvation diet and fluid you have to drink the night before. Basically they starve you for a day, and make you drink 2 litre’s of baking soda water (with so called “flavoring” that makes it maybe 1% more drinkable). Not only do you have to drink 2 litre’s but you have to drink it within 90 minutes. For someone who can barely drink a full can of soda or bottle of water within a few hours, fitting 2 liters of liquid in my stomach in 90 minutes was impossible, literally.  It took me nearly 2.5 hours to drink it, and well, I didn’t finish the last 8 ounces. I could actually feel the liquid slowly making its way back up my esophagus. I fell asleep instead of vomiting it up.  All night I was awakened with the sound of a chemistry experiment in my stomach. However, I didn’t spend the whole night in the john like I was warned about. Woke up at 6:30, made my normal morning visit to relieve my bladder, and well, you know….liquid in, liquid out!

Very nice IV work!

The real good part was the injection of the narcotic cocktail…and I woke up after what seemed like 2-3 minutes feeling just fine. Recovered for about 15 minutes. Recovering means working up the ability to make words come out of your mouth that form normal sentences. Went to lunch, and came home for a nice nap.

The nap was only interrupted 3 times by different doctors and nurses calling to move around appointments and tell me all the places Ineed to be over the next two days. Trust me I am not complaining. I am so thrilled I have a team of doctors that are working miracles to get my surgery done on Thursday so I will bend my schedule inside out and do whatever they tell me. Unless the MRI finds anything interesting, I will be moving forward with the mastectomy on Thursday morning before the roosters wake up. If they see anything on the MRI, I will need to have an additional ultrasound and possibly an additional biopsy. That will push my surgery into next week.

I operate under the philosophy of “Expect the worse, Hope for the best.” And i’ll do just that.

 

  1. Tracy says:

    Wishing you all the best for your surgery. I will be praying for you and sending you many good vibes! Love you Steph!
    Your Friend Since 3rd Grade,
    Tracy