#2 

My name is Judith - 
Judy to my family and long time friends, and now, in 2013, I have reached the respectable (???) age of 61.  My journey may have started many years ago (for all anyone can tell) but what I’m recording here is details since early spring of this year.

My husband, Mike, and I have 3 children, all grown.  Our family physician has been looking after our medical issues for several years - not that we have had that many.  When we turned 50 she asked us to take part in a fecal occult blood-testing program.  We simply picked up a package at the office, took very small smear samples of our stool for a couple of days and sent it off to a lab to test for blood.  Every year we have received a letter stating that both of us were clear, no blood and no concerns. 

This spring we receive another type of letter from our doctor asking us to both have a sigmoidoscopy. This is not a major procedure, but you do have to prepare your body a little bit.  In our case it was no solids before the procedure, a Fleet enema first thing in the morning, and then another administered one hour before our scheduled appointment.  We tend to do a lot of things together, so I booked our appointments back to back on May 28^th.  That way we could maximize our time at the hospital.  I went first.

Yes, it is a little uncomfortable having your posterior exposed, larger than life, on the overhead monitor while a lady tech introduces a rubber tube containing a light and camera into your anus.  It isn’t actually painful (your bowel has pressure receptors but none for pain), but when they blow in air to facilitate passage of the tube, it sure is noticed!  As the procedure advances up the side of my intestine, the tech points out a few small, white bumps . . .   Polyps.