Well, I got it over with for another year. Friday afternoon, I donned the gown (which is, when you think about it, a funny term for the "garment" you get at the hospital), laid down on the table, took a very, very deep breath, and tried to keep my nervous wise-cracks to a minimum. This is a picture I took looking down at my pasty white thighs while Jenny (or possibly Jenni) pumped saline into my bladder from the wrong end. You can see the wires snaking across my leg: one from the EKG-type contact tape to my butt and one from the electronic butt plug that Jenny (or possibly Jenni) has gently lodged in my rectum. You can also just make out the tiny tube that connects the catheter to a gizmo that pumps the saline. Jenny (or possibly Jenni) controls the pump with a remote control like the one for your TV.
Each time I've had the hated pressure flow study, I think, I hope I never get to the point where I need to catheterize myself because I just couldn't do it. At the clinic where I've had it done for the last three years, they use a little pediatric-sized cath. Even so, the sensation of that little cath heading northwards up my urethra just takes my breath away. Jenny (or possibly Jenni) remarked that my study looked pretty much like last year's, maybe even a little better.
Afterwards, I took the rest of the afternoon off. I stopped at Whole Foods and bought some nice things: a few bottles of white Bordeaux, some sushi, some blue cheese, and some green olives packed with tasty little strands of seaweed.
technorati tag: multiple sclerosis
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