The fun part of turning 50!

Alright, let's put this to a vote. I'm going to let you guys decide what I should write about today. Your choices are:

1. A detailed analysis of the health-care bill currently being debated by the U.S. Senate.

2. An in-depth, line-by-line look at the Michigan state budget.

3. My colonoscopy.

OK, show of hands. How many of you want to read about No. 1? Good. No. 2? Fine. And No. 3?

Whoa. So it seems you all want to hear about my colonoscopy. Fine. This is a democratic column, and the people have spoken. If you want to hear about my colonoscopy, I'll tell you about my colonoscopy.

Up until maybe five years ago, I had no idea what a colonoscopy was. All I knew is that it was an oscopy that they performed on your colon. That was about it. I didn't know why they did it, and more importantly, I didn't know how they did it. I had no idea how they actually got inside your body to look at your colon.

Well, now I know. Oh, boy, do I ever.

This all came about because 2010 is the year when I will turn the big five-oh. And when a man turns 50, one of the fun and glorious things that happens to him is that he gets to have a colonoscopy. This is based on advice from all the major doctors out there, who all say the same thing: The minute a man turns 50, he needs to get a colonoscopy.

Throughout his 50s, he should get one every five years. In his 60s, he should get one every three years. In his 70s, he should get one every year. In his 80s, he should get a colonoscopy every couple of days. At least, that's what the doctors say.

Well, even though I don't turn 50 until August, I decided to get a jump-start on all the fun. So at the end of December, I had my first-ever colonoscopy.

Everyone who has ever had a colonoscopy will tell you the same thing: "The prep is the worst part."

"Prep" is short for "torture," and it's what you have to do the day before you actually head to the doctor's office for the procedure.

By the way, that's what all the people at the doctor's office call the colonoscopy. They call it a "procedure."

"Hi!" they say when you show up. "Are you here for your procedure?"

They never say the word "colonoscopy," because they must think you'll go running from the room if they start reminding you what you're actually there for. So they just keep calling it a "procedure," as though you'll somehow forget that you're about to have a camera stuck up your … um … body.

Anyway, before you can have the "procedure," you first need to do the prep. The idea here is that you need to clear out your colon before they can snake a camera up in there. And unfortunately, there's only one way to clear out a colon.

About 24 hours before your colonoscopy - excuse me, "procedure" - you have to stop eating. For me, this was torture enough. I enjoyed a Subway sandwich and a bowl of soup at noon, and that was it until the next day. My stomach started grumbling about 20 minutes after I ate, because somehow it knew that it wasn't going to be seeing anything good for a while.

Then came the colon cleansing. I've heard that every doctor does this a little differently, but in my case, the doctor told me to take a laxative at bedtime, and then get up at 6 a.m. the next day and start taking more laxatives. Sure thing, doc. Sounds like a riot.

I had to mix in the fun powder with two big jugs of Gatorade, and then every 10 minutes, I had to gulp down 8 ounces of this stuff. How did it taste? Well, imagine crunching up six sticks of sidewalk chalk, mixing it with Gatorade, and then drinking it. Imagine that, and then imagine it tasting about 200 times worse, and you'll be pretty close to how it tasted.

In any case, I slugged down the two big jugs of chalky Gatorade, and sure enough, the mixture started working its magic. By 2 p.m., my colon was as clean as a whistle. (I still don't know what that expression means.)

Then, it was off to the doctor's office for the … um, procedure. They whisked me into the waiting room, asked me to take off all my clothes and put on a hospital gown. No problem. They poked an IV into my arm and off we went to the "procedure room."

Then my doctor came in, a very nice man whose job I certainly don't envy. It's obvious that we badly need colonoscopy doctors in our society, but I'm just not sure that I'd want to go through four years of college, four years of medical school, and eight years of internship and residency just to spend my days staring at that particular part of the human anatomy. That's all I'm saying.

Thankfully, though, my doctor was top-notch, but before he actually began the procedure, he had to read me the standard disclaimer that they're forced to read to everybody ("While it's unlikely that anything will go wrong, it's possible that this procedure will result in rashes, infection, paralysis, scabies, rabies, shingles, warts, acne, charley horses or death"). Yeah, yeah. Sure, sure. Let's just get this over with.

And that's when the procedure officially began. At least, I think that's when the procedure actually began, because I really don't remember a thing. They gave me some goofy gas or something through the IV, and I slipped into a semi-sleep. I was sort of asleep and sort of awake, but I didn't feel or remember a thing. It was great. I want them to give this same stuff every time I have to watch a Michigan football game next season. I heard the doctor talking, but it was sort of like Charlie Brown's teacher ("Wah, wah, wah, wah, wah…").

The next thing I know, I'm in the recovery room and the doc is telling me that everything went well. They removed a small, harmless polyp, and that was that. Thanks for coming … I'll see you in another five years.

And so, I survived my first colonoscopy. Everyone was right - the prep was far worse than the procedure, but even the prep wasn't that bad. If you're 50 or over and you haven't yet had a colonoscopy, schedule one today.

One thing, though: I can absolutely guarantee that you'll never want to take another sip of Gatorade ever again.

Buddy Moorehouse is the publisher of Livingstontalk.com. You can e-mail him at buddy@livingstontalk.com.

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Buddy Moorehouse's column is sponsored by: PJ's Hot Dogs LLC. Serving wienies since '01. Visit us Saturdays at the Howell Tractor Supply, at www.PJsHotDogs.com, or call 517-861-6628.

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