Remember to get scoped, if you need them

It's a traditional unlike any other. For good reason.

Whenever I have an endoscopy and/or a colonoscopy, I post something about it here. The goal is to convince anyone who is on the fence about getting either procedure to do it.

It's easy to procrastinate, because the doctor will only do so much to get you to do it. Ultimately, you have to choose to do it.

I didn't want to do one, and I put it off despite some symptoms suggesting I needed one. Only after a Hemoccult test in 2011 came back positive did I have a colonoscopy. And it turns out I had Crohn's disease.

I've had five or six since then (I've lost count). Today, I had my first one since 2021, along with an endoscopy. (It makes sense to do them together, since you get knocked out for each one.)

It's an easy process. The prep gets a little old, what with the drinking of the laxative and the sprinting to the bathroom and the waking up, say, five times last night to sprint to the bathroom.

Somehow, I made it through two hours of PFT Live without an impending intestinal requirement. Then, after the show, I made the speed walk to the loo four times before leaving for the appointment, at UPMC in Pittsburgh.

As to the procedure itself, they make you comfortable and they put you in the right position and then it's over. It's amazing. It's just over. You wake up, you're groggy, you find out the results, you drink some ginger ale, and then (in my case) you come home and eat an entire filet and half of a ribeye.

This time, I had a polyp. Small. 6 millimeters. Didn't appear cancerous and likely wasn't precancerous, but they'll check it out.

Even if it were cancerous, it would have been caught early. That's the key. If you have something like that, the earlier you catch it, the better. And if you can get a benign polyp removed before it turns malignant, even better.

The procedure literally can save your life. So do it, if you need one. Age, family history, whatever. Once a doctor says, "It's time," embrace the opportunity to make sure your pipes are clean.