Botty Talk

Rectal examinations do, of course, differ all over Europe.

My guts are bad again - bad, bad, bad! I feel bloody awful and my spirits are not being lifted by the prospect of what is to come........I'm going to have to go for another "clothesline"!
The problem is, you see, Pither and his colon are not the best of friends. Colin, as I refer to him, is a spastic. That's not an un-PC term of abuse, you understand. It's what passed for a clinical diagnosis some years ago. Spastic colon, which I happen to think is a much more accurate term, has been replaced these days by that awful and almost meaningless term "irritable bowel syndrome". Eeeyuk! Everyone who has a slight stomach upset is now free to join our crap colon club (pun intended) and say they know how we feel because they have just the same condition. Well they don't!! Back off!!!
IBS is a coverall term now used by what passes for the medical profession for anything anyone has wrong with their digestive tract at any given time but which our hapless docs can't be bothered to diagnose properly. It can range from a slight case of the "flock of sparrows" the morning after the night before to what a little investigative work would pinpoint as cholera!
I refuse to accept this pat diagnosis. Besides, I go red and want to run off whenever I hear the word "bowel" mentioned in polite company. Colin is a spastic, and a spastic he shall always be.
In brief, my understanding of the condition is that the epithelial lining of the colon becomes fucked, for some reason, with the result that, when various differing types of trigger are activated (wheat, stress, caffeine, booze, etc.), the colon slams shut for varying periods of time. This means you are unable to digest food and so become progressively weaker and more tired (not to mention more full of shit than normal) while, at the same time, becoming progressively hungrier. The resultant tendency to ram more food down your cakehole then often starts off a vicious circle of further annoying the lining and so further stopping any digestion. Got it? The explanation, I mean? Good.
Colin started turning spazzy about eight years ago and so I had to undergo a plethora of tests and humiliating examinations. Girlies are used to these, I know, what with smear tests and chuff doctors and their love of organic potholing. You get to know your doctor pretty well by the end of them, I can assure you.
I had no sooner described the symptoms to my GP than he had the rubber gloves on and a finger up my arse. Mind you, I got the impression it was something he liked to do in his spare time in the privacy of his home anyway.
The digital delve leads on to the colonoscopy.

Who, in their right fucking mind and not gay, finds having a camera shoved up their arse funny?!

A colonoscopy is where hospital docs shove an entire film crew, complete with canary and cloaked camera, up your backside to have a gander around.
Would you believe, as you are lying there, face down, clenching for all you are worth, they wheel a TV monitor up to you and say "Look! You can see what the camera is seeing!" My reply the first time I had one of these procedures was "It's better than Big Brother but isn't there something better on the other side?" The woman responsible for making my first derriere documentary (yes, humiliation of humiliations, it was A WOMAN) finished filming, called it a wrap, and said: "Well, Mr Pither. We haven't discovered anything." I replied: "Oh yes you have! You now know I'm not gay because you almost didn't get your sodding camera back!"
If you still persist on telling them you're not well then they move on to the gastroscopy.
I REALLY wasn't feeling well that day!

This time they ram the film crew and associated equipment down your throat! You are given a throat spray which they say will relax your gullet so you won't feel the urge to wretch. That spray is about as effective as a knee plaster on Douglas Bader! You spend the whole time trying to chuck up while your gurgling and attempts to vomit are ignored and all the time the medical team ponces about wondering if the lighting is good and what Variety will make of the results.
"We still haven't found anything wrong, Mr Pither," they twined, looking at me in a "he's another fucking hypochondriac" sort of a way. "Well why do I still feel like death warmed up, have bloating in my guts and haven't had a stiff shit in a month, then?" I not unreasonably enquired.
They don't like people who insist on still being ill when they've almost exhausted the chapters of their "Janet and John Do Diagnosis" book without coming up with anything and so they have one last trial for you........the clothesline!
This is where the hospital staff really have some fun! Other departments apparently close down for the day so the doctors and nurses can go over and cram into the examination room for a laugh. You lie on a couch, face down, wearing one of those oh-so-trendy, open-at-the-back hospital gowns, while two sadists simultaneously ram cameras down your throat and up your ass until they all-but meet, Channel-Tunnel-Diggers-like, somewhere by your stomach. You become a human pig-roast. It is, to say the least, somewhat uncomfortable and painful.
Well, that is what is in store, now that Colin has started fucking around again. So, if you're having a bad day, always remember that there is someone worse off than you.............it's me!!
Colons can go to Grantham.