A few years back I had my first colonoscopy, the dreaded roto-rooter.
The coming of age for seniors, where you are officially admitted to the old-timers club and are worthy of your senior discounts.
Now just a couple of years later, they tell me I need a cystoscopy, where they go in through a man’s urethra with a camera and look at your prostate to see if you need any of the multiple procedures available for prostate health or to see if you have one of the multiple potential cancers associated with the prostate, bladder or kidneys.
This procedure had me stressed, my heartbeat was up, my blood pressure was high, my glucose was climbing and I was having dreaded thoughts about what could potentially go wrong. Sitting there on the examination table with no anesthesia and just some numbing topical ointment on my private parts before the doctor inserts the camera can make one feel a little on edge and a little embarrassed if you’re on the shy side.
After the camera was entered, I felt faint as we watched my prostate on the monitor. I thought I saw two little men walking on the left side of my prostate, so I shouted silently to them “smile and say cheese!” I’m glad the doc and nurse couldn’t hear me. The only question that remains is where will medical science decide the next best place for a camera?
If you have this procedure, make sure you have a great doctor and supporting staff, as I did. The best thing to develop from COVID was the online virtual doctor’s visits. Now if they could only figure out how to do procedures like this and surgeries online without leaving home!
After this event, I could finally breathe and gloat about the success of the procedure. I was telling my female neighbor about this process and she was astounded that a camera could fit up a man’s urethra. We talked about modern medicine and then she said, “Do they use a Digital Single Lens Reflex 35mm camera or smartphone when taking the pictures inside your urethra?” I told her, on me, they used a 35mm Single-Lens Reflex camera with a 200 mm lens! We both laughed, she then said grinning with a big fat smile on her face, “you only wish!”
•••
James “Kimo” Rosen is a humorist most of the time and a photographer who lives in Kapa‘a with his dog
