Churchill said that first. And Churchill knew a thing or two about the old saying that things come in threes-except when they come in eights or nines and just keep coming.
When I last wrote I'd been away for a few days, and everything was quiet and peaceful. Of course, that was doomed to end sooner or later. Sooner, in fact, which is why you're only hearing from me now. I'm either a pessimistic optimist or an optimistic pessimist. Either way, shortly after I last wrote, the shit hit the fan. No shit splatter, though, because it didn't just hit the fan. It was as if I was standing still, minding my own business, and a cosmic sized pile of shit fell right on my head. I've spent the past few weeks digging myself out (speaking figuratively, of course!).
I started to lose weight-a lot of weight-and for no reason. I like my food, so there wasn't the eating disorder that would first come to mind. I started losing weight, then I just wasn't hungry. My GP requested a sample. And it showed the presence of blood. So she sent an urgent request to the colorectal cancer surgeons at my hospital (not the local one, which is known for taking your arm off if you go to the emergency room with a headache).
A word about specimens: the specimen bottles used to be little round ones that were easy to fill. These newer ones are plastic, shaped like test tubes, and if you have to provide a sputum sample, good luck: you need to cough with the top of the bottle next to your mouth, then spit and hope for the best. Now-the other bottles are exactly the same, except that the very small lid holds-get this!-a tiny spoon. Someone who designed these-did they really have a degree in engineering?
The easy-ish way is to use a paper plate. Truly. You have to be double jointed, really. Poo on the plate, trying very hard not to miss and hit the floor, and pebbledash your bathroom. Then-wearing gloves, obviously, and thanking someone somewhere that your doing yours, not someone else's (wouldn't that be gross), and try to use the tiny spoon to fill the tube-while trying very hard not to laugh.
And the colorectal team sent me for a CT scan, which was supposed to be urgent but ended up taking three weeks for the report to go to the surgeons (bless the NHS for crappy timing).
Meanwhile, I just keep losing weight, even though I've eaten massive numbers of calories every day. And-luckily-tomorrow I will have a gastroscopy and colonoscopy to see what is causing all this.It's a good thing, because if this went on much longer, I wouldn't have to use doors. I could just slide under them.
If you've never had the combination colonoscopy/gastroscopy, you are so lucky! You have to only eat white bread, skinless chicken-all bland foods and absolutely no fiber. I'm not hungry and I'm fantasizing over a peanut butter and banana sandwich! The day before, you drink this stuff I call drain cleaner-because it's supposed to flush out everything that's in your system so the doctor can see what's going on inside.
Oh, joy-you're up all night, and on the day someone plays hunt the vein to cannulate you. I always end up with so many bruises on both arms that I look like I've been on drugs. You get sedated-but you feel it when someone shoves a tube the size of a garden hose into your mouth and tells you to swallow. Oh sure. Have you ever tried to swallow a hosepipe?
There is absolutely no way to maintain any sense of dignity during these procedures. Once they remove the hosepipe from your mouth, you get rolled on your side and another one gets shoved up the back end. At least-I hope it's another one, and they're not rinsing off the first one and reusing it.
I remember years ago, when I had one of these-and I knew the doctor for years before, so it was more or less okay. I asked him afterwards why they just don't shove one hosepipe down and one hosepipe uf and just tie a knot in the middle. He laughed. Now he's in private practice in Harley Street, making the big bucks. If I could, I'd go back to ask him to handle this.
At the same time, when it was all over, someone asked how I was feeling. I just had a hosepipe shoved up and down both ends, how do you think I'm feeling?? I just said that the whole thing was so painful-I will never understand how anyone-unless they're masochistic, insane, or have no nerve endings-would ever, EVER, want to have anal sex.
I'm thinking of having a t-shirt made. It'll be white, with black printing. On the back there will be a huge arrow pointing down, all the way to the hem. On the top of that, in big black letters, it'll say:
EXIT ONLY
Maybe on the front, there will be an arrow pointing up, with the saying FOOD GOES HERE
I'm still working on it. Think it'll catch up?
I'm off to have more black coffee, a load of water, the drain cleaner later-so I'll see you at the weekend, and hope that everything goes according to plan. Huh-nothing ever goes according to plan!
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