Going Lightly

Spazz Dad evaluates his place in life before getting a colonoscopy

Image credit: Photo by iwona_kellie via Creative Commons

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By: Todd Smith

I suffer from Crohn’s Disease, an inflammatory bowel disease. The condition affects every aspect of my life: travel, job, exercise, and diet. Through a diligent and healthy lifestyle combined with numerous medications, my current condition is relatively stable. But an unfortunate part of my medical treatment is undergoing the dreaded colonoscopy (before we go any further: this is not a story about the colonoscopy procedure; while I readily admit that I’m somewhat low brow, I’m not Johnny Knoxville).

I recently underwent the procedure. The night before my scheduled colonoscopy I had to take a powerful laxative to clean out my system. The name of the laxative was “Go Lightly,” which, for the record, is the worst name for a laxative as there was nothing light about its affects. The laxative was thick and salty and it was like drinking ocean water. A nurse told me I could mix Crystal Light into it to make it more drinkable. This, it turned out, was the best single piece of advice that I have received in the last ten years. I mixed the laxative with a lemonade flavor booster and had sort of a crohnsie cocktail party in my kitchen. I did not eat any food for the entire day and because of this my lovely wife Sarah said my musty breath smelled like “a pile of cardboard.”

On the morning of the procedure, I showed up at the clinic completely hollowed out. I was exhausted and cranky and unshaven and so hungry that I wanted to eat everything that I saw. The gastrointestinal clinic I visited administers about 100 routine colonoscopies a day, so the lobby was packed with fellow patients all irritably waiting for their name to be called for their turn. As I sat in the lobby (ironically reading METRO) I took a moment to evaluate my life: I was 39 years old, sitting next to my Mom who drove me to the hospital and was now silently knitting, and I was suffering from a condition that has to be one of the lamest of all the major medical conditions. Every time I tell someone that I suffer from Crohn’s Disease they either recoil in slight disgust or make a joke involving the phrase “poopy pants.” Now, cancer isn’t exactly a cool thing to have and I would never wish it on anyone. But at least cancer patients have got Lance Armstrong and inspiring yellow bracelets and popular fund raising marathons and ribbons to draw some uplifting who-ha. The walk to benefit Crohn’s Disease research is roughly a block long and a wall of portable toilets line the entire route for the participants. And the event tee-shirts are brown. WTF?

Worse still, as I sat there feeling miserable and old and seriously unsexy, the song “Wicked Game” by Chris Isaak played overhead on the lobby sound system. I recalled how the popular 90s era video for “Wicked Game” featured erotic frolicking on a tropical beach. Oh, how far I was from that.

“Smith, Todd,” a nurse called out. I got up, greeted her and went into a procedure room to undress. I stripped naked and put on a gown with my keister hanging out the back and a pair of tiny socks. Then the nurse came in. I stood before her and I was a complete physical mess: sour breath, hollowed out stomach, and severely hangry (so hungry that I was angry). The nurse looked at me and a warm look came across her face.

“Wow,” the nurse gushed. “You have really nice hair.”

+ This blog is dedicated to my friend Chris Clayton, METRO’s former editor in chief, who for several years graciously helped me hone in my writing voice, and told me to go out into the world and try to find humor in every situation and write about it. Cheers, mate.