Unlike a lot of folks, I can remember way, way back. I can even remember my very first birthday party. We lived in a tiny apartment in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. The birthday cake is what I remember so vividly.
It was round, with white frosting and blue and yellow icing. It had a little round train track on top, with a little train on it. What little boy wouldn’t remember that? Best birthday ever.
There’s another early memory I have that is not so good. I was around 4 at the time. I made the mistake of telling my parents that I hadn’t pooped in a week. I had no idea this simple admission would become such a big deal.
My parents were very laissez-faire in their parenting style. As long as my brothers and I weren’t playing with fire or knives or killing each other, we could basically do what we wanted. That’s why I was so blown away by what happened next.
My father comes home from work, and next thing I know we’re all in the tiny bathroom. He has a bag with him. In it is a pink rubber bladder of some sort. After filling the thing with water, he hangs it from the shower rod. There is a long plastic tube hanging from the pink thing.
The next thing I know the tube is inserted into my rectum and I start screaming, screaming, screaming at the top of my lungs. I had no idea at the time that anything this bizarre and evil even existed in the world.
So much for my first and only enema. I don’t know what happened later, but they never did it again so it must have worked.
Despite the fact that humans can achieve all sorts of fantastic feats in the worlds of science, sports, the arts, and so much more, we are still all just animals, albeit ones with high intelligence (although if you read the news you may not believe that most of the time).
We have to find suitable food stuff to ingest on a regular basis, extract all the nutrients, and then excrete the waste products. We have to do this so often it’s kind of hard to believe we have time to get anything else done.
All of history is the story of figuring out how to get enough food and how to handle the waste. Read about New York City in the early 1800s before the city got sanitary infrastructure in place, when horses were the main method of transportation. It wasn’t pretty and it must have smelled just terrible.
I’m bringing all this up now because recently I found out I needed to have not one but two enemas. Talk about a pain in the rear! What happened was my doctor noticed that my PSA (prostate specific antigen) level was slowly getting higher. This happens to all men as we age.
So it was determined I should have a prostate biopsy just to be safe. That meant first having an MRI ( magnetic resonance imaging) scan – my old friend, not. Before the scan and the biopsy, I would need to have an enema. Hooray!
My first step was to the pharmacy to buy the enema. Have you ever noticed how people get all quiet and sad and look down in deep concentration when they shop in the pharmacy? I mean, who wants their neighbors to see them pricing out enemas or adult diapers or hemorrhoid cream, ouch.
Soon I was able to find a two-pack of Fleet enemas. Honestly, I had no idea what this product would cost. I mean they could have said it cost $100 and I would have believed it; what do I know about enemas?
I must have gotten “lucky,” as the two-pack was only $2.89. At this point, I should buy a case and resell them on eBay for $10. I could call myself The Enema Man. My theme song could be “Lookin’ Out My Back Door.”
Wouldn’t you think all the “action,” as it were, involving an enema would take place on the toilet? That’s what I thought, but I was wrong, as usual. According to the instructions, you are supposed to lie on the floor on your left side and slowly — yes, slowly — insert the enema while “pointing it at the naval.” I mean, you can’t make this stuff up.
As I got ready to do this horrible thing to myself, I decided to try adding a little music to the otherwise very depressing milieu. But what kind of music do you play during an enema? Never thought about that before.
It couldn’t be pop, because what if “How Deep is Your Love” came on? Ouch! It couldn’t be opera or classical. Those are too dignified for such a disgusting act. Then I thought it would have to be the blues. I mean, if sticking something so invasive up your butt isn’t the blues, then what the heck is?
But in the end — no pun intended — I went with the Sirius/XM “Outlaw Country” channel, “coming to you live from Mudlick, Kentucky,” as they loudly proclaim all the time. I figure between Outlaw Country regulars Willie Nelson, Kris Kristofferson, Waylon Jennings, and Johnny Cash there must have been a few enemas. Good company to be in.
When the appointed time came, I laid down on my left side and, ahem, inserted the appliance into my rectum. Then I squeezed the bottle. The instructions said, at this point, to wait until you feel a bowel movement coming on before moving.
At this most intimate and delicate time, these are the thoughts that came to me:
— If there is a benevolent creator who loves us, why didn’t He make it so there wouldn’t even be a need for enemas in the first place? Come on, man;
— If I’m supposed to lie on the floor filled with poop solution until I feel the urge to go, what’s the chance I won’t have an accident before even making it to the toilet?;
— Why, for crying out loud after all these years, doesn’t the Capitol District have a zoo, an IKEA, a Wegmans, a Stew Leonards, and a White Castle, to say nothing of a decent pastrami sandwich?
When I finally made it to the toilet, I found that the product did indeed work, but not all at once, if you know what I mean. You need to sit there and bide your time until the tsunami subsides. In any case, I’m glad I was able to get it over with, and do it all by myself.
My wife offered to help, but she’s put in her time over the years, so I gave her a pass. In fact, she reiterated to me to just man up and take it because many people deal with a lot worse on a regular basis, and to be glad that at least I never had to go through childbirth. Point taken.
There’s a reason men aren’t made to have children, obviously. For me to go throw something like that I’d need a fifth of Jack Daniels and some Cuban cigars, just to start. And that’s before conception; can you imagine after?
On “Seinfeld,” nutty neighbor Kramer had to have an enema. When he was asked how it went, he said it was “wet and wild.” He nailed it for certain.
Having to self-administer an enema is, literally, a pain in the you-know-where. On the other hand, I’m glad my doctor is looking out for me. And now you’ll have to excuse me. I need to go find a soft spot to sit down on.
