I'm 45 or 46, one. OK 46. So the Spousal Unit has been on my case about my health. What with all the salads she's serving me. But that's what she's supposed to do. Starting last summer, she has been hustling me to health fairs and the dentist and the gym. Nonstop. Well, this time I finally went to the doctor, and got the dreaded middle age man's prostate cancer exam. Plus, I got a colon cancer screening. Looks like my butt was front and center today.
So I'm going to cut to the chase because what everybody wants to know is what I've not seen written about appropriately. Which is to say, there's this episode of Family Guy:
And then there's this kind of clinical language, like you get from WebMD:
For a digital rectal exam, you will take off your clothes below the waist. You will be given a gown to wear.
- A man is often examined while he stands, bending forward at the waist. A man can also be examined while lying on his left side, with his knees bent toward his chest.
- A woman is often examined while lying on her back on an examination table, with her feet raised and supported by stirrups. A rectovaginal exam is often done for women so that organs in the pelvic area can be checked.
Your health professional gently puts a lubricated, gloved finger into the rectum. He or she may use the other hand to press on the lower belly or pelvic area to feel for tenderness or problems, such as enlargement, hardness, or growths.
It's somewhere in the middle.
My new doc, Dr. Matsuno is a slim guy about my age. I would describe his bedside manner as abstractly talkative. He was talking to me and to the computer at the same time, mostly because I was in my skivvies and socks. Not much direct eye contact.
Now I'm the kind of guy who, in high school, absolutely hated showers at PE. Primarily because I was little. In the 9th grade, since I had skipped a grade, I was 4 foot 8 and 88 pounds. I remember that very well, as you might imagine, me being smaller than a 98 pound weakling. My only consolation was that I could bench press 135, which gave me the second highest power to weight ratio in my class. Just like the geek I was, I would never let anyone forget it. But by the time I filled out my frame, and otherwise accepted my own greatness, I was very comfortable in showers and curious as to why other men might still not be. So, sitting in the doctor's office without the robe was no big deal, nor was the traditional hernia check.
Speaking of which, is it just me or are hernia checks a lot more light fingered and brief these days? When I was a teenager I remember coughing 4 and 6 times. Hmm. Maybe I just attracted the wrong kind of attention.
So Matsuno is monologuing about the things he's considering about my family health history and what I might need to expect between now and the big 50 (it's all good), and just matter of factly starts up with the rubber glove. "And now we're going to want to check the prostate. So go ahead and lean over the table and put your elbows on the paper."
OK it's like taking a reverse dookie except the dookie is cold. What I can tell is that there's some straight area and then the colon must take a turn down or something. Yes I did take a gulp of air and yes, my eyes did bug for a moment. Then I relaxed a bit and tried to figure out what was going on back there. He basically takes a swipe along the colon with his finger just like you would as if you were trying to get a hairball out of the drain in your sink. He was basically feeling for some lumps, and finding none, pulled out quick.
It's all very swift and simple of course. But to be honest, I was feeling it longer than the Tetanus booster or the blood sample. I could swear that he said, "there's going to be a little pressure" and I chuckled internally at that one. Doctors always call it 'pressure'. But this time it was pretty accurate. Nothing painful at all. Way easier to take than when you wipe your butt too many times with bad toilet paper.
Ten minutes later I was out of there and bought myself a nice salmon lunch at the pier. It's good to know you're healthy.
Pops went through the whole radiation therapy several years ago, so I knew that I was due to get my check sooner or later. Generally, as Matsuno said, men don't have to get checked until 50, but I'm going to be back every year from now on to make sure my family history doesn't catch up to me in a bad way. A small price to pay. So if you're about my age, you may as well get it over with.
Now as for the colon cancer screening, that was a bit more complicated. For that I had to bring three days of stool samples. That's one I'd rather describe in the abstract, because basically I haven't had the inclination to check my own turds since puberty, and quite frankly I don't think all the digestional microbes I'm hosting are on their j.o.b. But the kit consists of a set of six indentations under three flaps of a postcard sized flat cardboard package. In three successive days, you take three poops and dab two indentations a day with... well you know.. dookie. They provide the sticks. You need to get a piece from each end of the poop to insure a good sample.
The trickiest part of this exercise is to remember that you have to do it. So I found myself on the pot at 11pm the other night trying to get something useful out of the business end of my intestines. I already wasted some gems at the Hustler Casino in Gardena at 2am that morning and I hadn't eaten much all day. I didn't realize how difficult it can be to poop on demand. Matsuno took these and dropped a litmus into each of the indentations looking for blood. It was also done quickly. I thought there would be some really long and involved process in that and it turns out that's rather simple too.
The miracles of modern science and medicine have made this stuff easy enough to joke about. But my uncle died of colon cancer and my father survived prostate cancer after some very exhausting treatments. Even though radiation therapy is easier on the body than chemo and Pops used to run marathons - I'd never seen him so tired. So obviously these cancers are no laughing matter. But hey, this is America and we can cure anything that can be cured. Pretty lucky I'd say.
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