It's never a good time getting a tube shoved up your bum & a tube shoved down your throat at the…read moresame time yet... that's exactly what I did here at Enloe Out Patient. PARTY! Not.
Yes, get the visual of being abducted by aliens & having the official human probe done on you. All happening while you're completely asleep & not feeling a single thing. I don't know if that's absolutely horrifically scary... or not. To be quite honest, I was quite mortified going into this appointment being that it was my first time being "probed". It didn't help that once I arrived, I had to wait TWO HOURS beforehand. That's an ENTIRE two hours to ponder... what is actually going to happen, how it's going to happen, & what they're going to find when it happens. But, I digress... having to drink an ungodly amount of Alka-Seltzer like substance prior to going in, & not being allowed to eat for almost 2 days (aside from being extremely anxiety ridden of what was about to happen) didn't make my 2 hours of waiting very pleasurable.
Upon arriving, I sat in the waiting area (which was a bit difficult to find from the front door) until I was told that I could go back into the triage area, which was very open & VERY public, just a giant room w/a bunch of people that were able to see each other (because we were not actually in separate rooms). The "separation" was just a curtain, pretty much no privacy here at all. A lot of the curtains were completely open so I could see patients sitting in their beds. Weird to say the least.
Luckily, the nurse that checked me in & asked the barrage of questions prior to the procedure was kind & tried her best to put me at ease. Also, luckily, instead of having a needle shoved into the top of my hand, another nurse agreed to put it elsewhere. THANK THE LORD. **FYI, top of the hand is the absolute WORST place to have a needle put in. It's quite literally the MOST painful area a nurse can stick you. So far, 2 stars for the nice check in nurse, & the other nurse that agreed not to stick a needle on the top of my hand.
Once they were ready to take me back for my appointment, I was finally wheeled into a private room. The first person I saw was female, a very cold, placid face that reminded me of the skinny aunt from James & the Giant Peach movie. Literally no smile, no welcoming, "Hello how are you doing today?" Just nothing. I soon learned that this person was the anesthesiologist. While, she was separating some of the tubes/chords over my leg, she dropped something heavy on my shin & said absolutely nothing about it. She SHOULD have said, "Oops sorry about that" but nope, just the same cold demeanor until she finished doing whatever she was doing. It hurt, but yeah, awesome.
I noticed the doctor leaning against the counter, watching everything that was being done & even he was not warm & welcoming. Again, just nothing. The bedside manner was absolutely nonexistent, I felt like robots were doing the procedure. No smiles, no kindness, no, "Don't worry we're going to take good care of you today." JUST NOTHNG.
Because I was having an endoscopy at the same time as the colonoscopy, the doctor walked up & asked me to lift my head while he placed a plastic thing in my mouth, then wrapped a rubber piece to the back of my head so the mouthpiece would stay in place. The mouthpiece allows them to put the tube in the throat while the patient is passed out. Fun right?!? He didn't mention, "You can go ahead & adjust it until it's comfortable", he just plopped my head back down on the pillow. Again, awesome. I took it upon myself to adjust it & although it wasn't quite comfortable, it was more comfortable than how he put it on me.
In my experience, 100% of the time right before they give the sleepy drug, the anesthesiologist will say something like, "OK we're ready, go ahead & start counting from 10 backwards..." but not this time. The last thing I remember is adjusting the mouthpiece and the next moment they were telling me to "wake up, we're done". What?? When did?? But wait... we're done?? Once out of my fog, I could hear nurses saying "Bye, I'm off" to each other. I was super drowsy from the anesthesia but they kept shaking me saying "wake up". I was offered apple juice or water, & because of only a curtain hanging between us, I heard the nurse offer the guy next to me, apple juice, water , ginger ale, & crackers. Really? How come I wasn't offered that? The nurses seemed in a hurry to get the last of us out of there. Crazy that they kept me waiting 2 hours prior & then quickly shuffled me out after the fact. I would've appreciated not waiting so long upon arrival so that I could've had more time to rest after the procedure was over. The final (& 3rd star) is for the fact that I didn't have a sore bum or sore throat afterwards, lol. Ugh, praying I don't have to go back anytime soon but, if I do, I'm definitely requesting ginger ale AND crackers afterwards!