Friday, May 13, 2011

Ow.

Well, the deed is done. I’ve officially made my transition from Cavalier to Roundhead.

It was an….experience.

I have a theory. Hospital clothes are designed purely to humiliate you, and therefore keep you docile and compliant. There’s no other explanation. What other reason is there for hospital gowns to be backless and impossible to put on by yourself? When has a Doctor ever needed to get to your ass in a hurry?

In the two hours between getting changed and actually having the operation, I asked no fewer than six nurses this question and not a single one could give me an answer.

The less said about the transparent paper underwear I was given the better.

Actually, scratch that, because that underwear went a long way to making my day less pleasant.

You see, I was waiting for my operation on a ward…a 40x30 room shared with three other people. This was generally an upside, because it meant I had three equally nervous people having equally embarrassing procedures to provide entertainment while I was waiting.

The downside was the guy opposite me hadn’t bothered bringing a robe, and for my entire wait he sat there, reading a book with his legs spread wide…with his backless gown up somewhere around his thighs.

I hadn’t brought a book or anything to read because my mother, who is a filthy liar, told me that as my appointment was at 8am, I’d be going in first and wouldn’t be waiting….it turned out that 10 other people also had 8am appointments…so I spent well over an hour just sitting in the chair next to my bed, directly across from a bloke that was proudly displaying his meat and two veg.

Oh, but after a while, he decided to lie on his side on his bed, facing away…so at least I had his hairy arse crack to distract me from his balls.

The other guy opposite was an older gentleman who provided endless entertainment.

The week before your op, you go for a physical and you’re told multiple times to fast from midnight the day before your operation. A few days later you get a letter with all your instructions in print, including the words ‘DO NOT EAT OR DRINK FOR TWELVE HOURS BEFORE YOUR PROCEDURE’ in inch high letters.

So, the nurse asked the older guy when he’d last eaten. He smiled and told her all about the full English breakfast he’d had two hours ago.

The nurse told him he wasn’t supposed to eat anything. He swore that no-one had told him. When she told him it was on his letter, he swore that it wasn’t on his. When she told him it meant he’d have to wait until later that afternoon for his op…he just swore.

(In all honesty, after a minute he realized it was his mistake. He was quite a nice guy. He even offered me his newspaper once he’d read it… I took it gratefully and used it to shield myself from the other bloke’s nuts).

The last cast member of our little human drama was the toast coveter…but more on him later.

Anyway, at about quarter to eleven, a nurse came and got me and I went into ‘forward waiting’. This is where you go to a smaller waiting room and actually get on a gurney.

About 15 minutes later I was wheeled to the operating theatre by the World’s Most Bored Sounding Man, who obviously was required to talk to the patients to keep them at ease…either that or they employed him purely as an alternative form of sedation because fuck me he was boring.

So I found myself in the operating theatre ante-chamber and they put that needle thingy in the back of my hand (and did a really good job, actually, I don’t have the slightest hint of a bruise…the the anesthesiologist came in.

Okay, you know how when you’re having an operation, you kind of want an atmosphere of calm professionalism? I swear my anesthesiologist was the bollywood version of Billy Mays mixed with that uncle everyone has who cracks bad jokes at really inappropriate time.

He asked me what I was having done (You get asked that question a hundred times along with your name, age and date of birth to make sure they don’t mix you up with someone else.)

I said “I’m having a circumcision, unfortunately.”

He stood back, held his hands out at his sides and said “Eeeeeeyyyyy” (Yes, just like The Fonz) “Why unfortunate? We sharpening it! Your wife will like! Yes?”

I just looked at him blankly and waited for Ashton Kutcher to step out and tell me I’d been punked.

Then he asked me what I liked to drink.

“Uhhhh….coffee?” I said.

“No, not coffee!” he said. “Like alcohol! What booze you like?”

“Beer?” I said.

“An’ how much beer you drink?”

“A couple a month?” I responded.

“Okay, this feel like about four beers. Good beers, but all at once…just to get you started.”

“Ok.” I said.

Lying fucker. He pumped that shit through the needle in my hand, I felt my head go a bit fuzzy and the next thing I knew I was waking up in the recovery room with an oxygen mask on my face.

(Parental lie number two: My filthy liar of a mother also said I wouldn’t need anything to keep me occupied for the two hours they keep you in after the operation because, and I quote “You’ll be so out of it, you’ll just sleep…we’ll probably wheel you to the car in a wheelchair and you’ll get home and sleep for the rest of the day)

Instead, I woke up feeling like I’d just had a nice, refreshing nap. I was a bit loopy for five minutes when I first came round, but after that I was fine. By the time I was wheeled back to the ward, I felt like I could have driven home with no problems.

After getting my vitals tested, the nurse asked if I wanted something to eat. She was just dropping off some toast and jam and a small pot of coffee when the coveter was wheeled in. (Luckily, the bullock flasher had left, so there was nothing to put me off my food.)

The coveter looked over at me as soon as the nurse left and said:

“Where’d you get that? I’m starving!”

“They’ll offer you some when they’ve finished taking your vitals,” I responded.

“She just did.” he said, looking around the ward as if willing the nurse to appear.

“Nah,” I said, opening up my little package of jam. “They take them every ten minutes for about half an hour first.”

“Oh,” he said, looking disappointed.

I spread my jam on my toast and poured myself some coffee. I could feel his eyes boring into the side of my head.

“You look like you’re really enjoying that,” he said as I took my first bite.

“Mmm hmm,” I replied, non-commitally as he continued to stare.

“I really am starving, not eaten since ten last night.”

“Me too,” I said. And you can fuck off if you think I’m offering you half my toast, I added, mentally.

Seriously, have you ever tried to eat while a stranger is just staring at you? On the upside, it was good toast.

Luckily, his stare was interrupted when the surgeon came over to my bed to tell me how everything went. There’s not much to say about him…except that he looked and sounded almost exactly like George Takei.

When I made a joke about swelling and he said “Oh my!”… I damn near soiled myself trying to suppress a laugh.

Anyway, with my paper undergarments now a thing of the past, the nurse came over a few minutes later and gave me some equally embarrassing underwear…an awesome assless jockstrap I have to wear for a week.

Well, before they could let me go, I had to go to the bathroom just to check everything was still working, so I went to the bathroom and had a peek under the dressing… They could have forewarned me what the stitches would look like… I took a glimpse and saw that my old fella looked like Frankenstein’s neck (although not green, thank god).

Anyway, after that, they handed me some more dressings and some weapons grade painkillers.

Now I just have six weeks of healing time to look forward to. On the upside, at least I can piss in a straight line again.

Tuesday, May 10, 2011

Phimosis and Shitting Yourself

Ok, today I'm going to blog about something a little embarrassing. I was originally going to keep this entirely secret... but since my Mum has been telling everyone she brushes past since I made my appointment (and since remembering that I have no shame), I thought it would make an interesting post.

So, here it is:

Basically, about two years ago, I developed Phimosis. Those not interested in the gory details can skip the next paragraph.

Here's what happens: If you're uncircumcised, during normal...shall we say, 'activity'... you can get a tiny little split on the inside of your foreskin. When it heals, the skin around that area contracts a tiny bit because of the scar tissue...which makes your foreskin tighter, which makes you more prone to more tiny splits. Repeat this over a year or two and you end up with a foreskin so tight you can't retract it.

Imagine pissing through the eye of a needle and you've got a very good idea of what my bell-end looks like.

Anyway, after a certain point, the only way to fix it is with a circumcision. When I was in the States, with no medical insurance, there was nothing I could do about it. After returning to the UK, it was one of the first things I wanted to get sorted.

So, two weeks ago, I went to see my GP. He referred me to a specialist who I saw a week ago. Yesterday I went for my pre-op visit and I'll be going for the actual procedure on Friday.

(Allow me a second to point out that this is the reality of the awful, disgusting National Health Service waiting lists that opponents of 'Obamacare' hold up as the ultimate nightmare scenario...I'm on the waiting list for a whole eight days.)

Anyway, things are not exactly what I expected...and as such, I'm shitting myself.

At first, I found it really humorous that I was having the surgery on Friday the 13th. I laughed, made jokes, pretended to be worried...then I had my pre-op visit and promptly stopped laughing.

At the pre-op visit, they basically give you a general physical. They take your blood pressure, heart rate, listen to your lungs...basically make sure you're healthy enough for surgery.

Well, I'm talking to the nurse, and I say "So, this is done under a local anesthetic, right?"

She says no, I ask why that is (everything I'd read said circumcisions are done under a local anesthetic)....and then she proceeds to give me far too much information.

Basically, she told me they do it under a general because so many things can go wrong, and complications are less likely under a general because I won't be moving around.

This was enough info for me...but then she decided to tell me everything that could possibly go wrong... like nicking a blood vessel or severing a nerve ending. It's bad enough having people cut off parts of your Gentleman's Area without worrying about being left completely numb or impotent...forever, but then she told me that I'd take about six weeks to properly heal...and my first boner after the op would be...and I quote...'Quite painful because it's really common to pop a few stitches.'

...and as well as the basic, understandable worries of going under a general anesthetic and having people chop bits off my genitals....but I also have a few slightly more irrational fears:

For example, I know the people performing the operation are all highly trained, professional medical personnel who have done this particular procedure a hundred times before...but whatever way you look at it, I'm still going to be unconscious and helpless, with my cock out, in a room full of strangers.

I was seriously considering taking my camcorder and asking them if I can set it up to record the procedure... not because I'd ever want to watch it, but just so I'd have proof that they didn't draw a smiley face on my bell end, use it in an impromptu puppet show and then post the whole thing on youtube. I have this weird, irrational fear that I'll get home and find that my testicles have their own facebook profile.
Anyway, no matter how bad your Friday the 13th is...at least you're not having someone take a scalpel to your wedding tackle.