This article is intended for one person.
It’s for the one person out there who knows that he or she should have a colonoscopy, due to age or other factors. It’s for the one person who has decided to put it off until a more convenient window arrives for the two-day investment of time and effort and starvation and liquid intake and (eventually) liquid outflow. It’s for the one person who continues to fend off family members who continue to remind and cajole and beg and plead the person to schedule the procedure.
It’s for the one person who has a polyp that will turn malignant if not detected and removed soon. It’s for the one person who, if he or she gets the colonoscopy scheduled and undergoes the procedure and has the polyp removed before it becomes malignant will avoid a bout with cancer that could go badly and end poorly.
That’s the person this article is intended for. You. You don’t know about that polyp, but you know that you need to be checked for it. You know that you’ve been putting it off. You know that your family has been hounding you, and that they will continue to do so. And when you get the colonoscopy that removes the polyp that would have turned malignant and could have ended your life and impacted multiple other lives in a horribly negative way, you won’t know for sure that it would have gone that way if you hadn’t had the procedure.
But you’ll definitely know that you and your family won’t endure that outcome, because you did what you had to do, for yourself and for them.
I mention this whenever I have a periodic colonoscopy. The first one happened in 2011, when I learned that I have Crohn’s disease. The next happened in 2012, 2015, 2019, and again today.
I got good news earlier; minimal inflammation and no new polyps. (I’ve had one.) And I won’t need another procedure until 2024.
So this is likely the last time you’ll hear about this for three years. Which means this is my last chance to reach that one person before it’s possibly too late.
Are you out there? Are you paying attention? Will you start the process tomorrow morning to schedule your colonoscopy?