Friday, June 16, 2006
Most of today...goodness! I'm actually writing about "today" today!
Anyway, most of today has been involved in awaiting and living through the bowel cleaning I set in motion two days ago with a mild dose of laxative and extremely high fiber foods since. If you care to, you can read about it, in disgusting detail, over at The Dailies for today's date. I was beginning to think, after waiting so long for the event, that she wasn't really stuffed with shit and the laxatives and fiber had been unnecessary. I'm glad I was wrong. She definitely needed a colon cleansing.
We didn't even walker today because Mom spent the entire day feeling as though she was going to eliminate any minute. She didn't want to risk a shit walk, and I didn't blame her.
So, that's pretty much all we did all day; wait for Movements. We were rewarded. Strange day, though. Usually these things happen by surprise. I can't recall ever spending an entire day waiting for her bowel movement(s).
She was in very good spirits just before retiring, which she insisted on doing after The Cleansing. I didn't stop her, even though we'd had other plans. I mentioned that she must be feeling 100% better, now that "it" was over.
"Make that 1,000% and you'd be closer to the truth," she said. Episodes like this remind me of the accidental colonic that was provoked, doctor's orders, before the colonoscopy and my decision, after a discussion about what I observed as its effects with her hematologist, to induce this on occasion (the type of occasion mentioned in the immediately previous link). Despite my intentions, I never followed up on doing this. Usually, it happens spontaneously, as it did today. Sometimes these spontaneous episodes are extremely uncomfortable, as the one discussed in Love and All That Shit. I'm wondering, after the last few days and their culmination in today, if it might not be a good idea to scare this intention up out of the pile of all my good but forgotten intentions and resolve to clean her out every six months or so, and/or whenever I think she's probably carrying a load. If I do it easily and gently, it certainly couldn't hurt.
Over the years I've come across lots of information about bowel movements: Everything from the assertion that colonics are not necessary, the "toxins" alternative healers like us to believe are slowing us down aren't really doing this, their just waiting to be eliminated in a normal fashion; to the belief, recently asserted in that book phenomenon about everything you should know about health care but don't (which actually turned out to be an expensive advertising pamphlet meant to solicit even more expensive memberships to the author's website) that the "normal" person should be having bowel movements up to six times a day. Can you imagine that? When would you get anything done?
My feelings about bowel movements are pretty much seat of the pants (horrible pun, I know, but I simply couldn't resist it) ideas based on personal experience: I always feel better after I've had a bowel movement, even if this feeling is so common that I rarely notice it; and, I always feel super after I've had a bout of diarrhea, completely cleaned out and ready to go. Although I almost never experience classic constipation (being constipated, for me, means I've missed my daily bowel movement), when I was still menstruating I would become "constipated" the day before my period started. After the first bowel movement, which usually came right on the heels of the beginning of the flow, always ushered in a feeling of complete body relief, even if I was suffering cramps at the time. I can't help but think that when my mother gets clogged, although she claims not to be able to tell, that she, too, probably feels sluggish and, well, shitty. So, I'm thinking that the occasional very gentle cleaning, much like I engineered over the past few days, might be a good habit to develop.
Of course, I would not do this if she was experiencing a health crisis of some kind. But, you know, as part of her mundane health regimen, it might not be a bad idea.
Later.
We didn't even walker today because Mom spent the entire day feeling as though she was going to eliminate any minute. She didn't want to risk a shit walk, and I didn't blame her.
So, that's pretty much all we did all day; wait for Movements. We were rewarded. Strange day, though. Usually these things happen by surprise. I can't recall ever spending an entire day waiting for her bowel movement(s).
She was in very good spirits just before retiring, which she insisted on doing after The Cleansing. I didn't stop her, even though we'd had other plans. I mentioned that she must be feeling 100% better, now that "it" was over.
"Make that 1,000% and you'd be closer to the truth," she said. Episodes like this remind me of the accidental colonic that was provoked, doctor's orders, before the colonoscopy and my decision, after a discussion about what I observed as its effects with her hematologist, to induce this on occasion (the type of occasion mentioned in the immediately previous link). Despite my intentions, I never followed up on doing this. Usually, it happens spontaneously, as it did today. Sometimes these spontaneous episodes are extremely uncomfortable, as the one discussed in Love and All That Shit. I'm wondering, after the last few days and their culmination in today, if it might not be a good idea to scare this intention up out of the pile of all my good but forgotten intentions and resolve to clean her out every six months or so, and/or whenever I think she's probably carrying a load. If I do it easily and gently, it certainly couldn't hurt.
Over the years I've come across lots of information about bowel movements: Everything from the assertion that colonics are not necessary, the "toxins" alternative healers like us to believe are slowing us down aren't really doing this, their just waiting to be eliminated in a normal fashion; to the belief, recently asserted in that book phenomenon about everything you should know about health care but don't (which actually turned out to be an expensive advertising pamphlet meant to solicit even more expensive memberships to the author's website) that the "normal" person should be having bowel movements up to six times a day. Can you imagine that? When would you get anything done?
My feelings about bowel movements are pretty much seat of the pants (horrible pun, I know, but I simply couldn't resist it) ideas based on personal experience: I always feel better after I've had a bowel movement, even if this feeling is so common that I rarely notice it; and, I always feel super after I've had a bout of diarrhea, completely cleaned out and ready to go. Although I almost never experience classic constipation (being constipated, for me, means I've missed my daily bowel movement), when I was still menstruating I would become "constipated" the day before my period started. After the first bowel movement, which usually came right on the heels of the beginning of the flow, always ushered in a feeling of complete body relief, even if I was suffering cramps at the time. I can't help but think that when my mother gets clogged, although she claims not to be able to tell, that she, too, probably feels sluggish and, well, shitty. So, I'm thinking that the occasional very gentle cleaning, much like I engineered over the past few days, might be a good habit to develop.
Of course, I would not do this if she was experiencing a health crisis of some kind. But, you know, as part of her mundane health regimen, it might not be a bad idea.
Later.
