Mommy, what's that?

Thanks to all those who called and/or emailed to check on me.

I did not stay over night but I was there until rather late. By the time I got home I was just too tired to do anything other then crawl into bed where I stayed until well afternoon yesterday.

The ER was quite busy when I showed up so I had to wait for a while before they took me in. When they did finally get me in they drew blood right off the bat to check to see if I was anemic. Apparently low iron in the blood can be an indication of colo-rectal tumor or cancer. While apparently everyone will lose blood in their feces daily, it is such a minor amount. However with a tumor/cancer the amount can increase to somewhere between 2-10ml a day (5ml is about 1 teaspoon).

After the blood test and some general questions the doctor decided that he should have a look to check for signs of hemorrhoids and anything else that might look "out of place" according to him. Of course this involved having to drop my drawers in the ER. While they have the "rooms" divided by curtains they never close all the way and anyone walking by gets a free show. For me this meant the poor girl (teenagerish, her mother and the nurse in the next "room"). While I have no problem with medical personnel having to check me out complete strangers are another story.

Anyway, the doctor asked me to go ahead and remove my sweat pants and boxers (I always wear sweats/windsuit to the doctor as they are more comfortable and easily removed should the need arise) and then bend over with my hands on the bed. As I am doing this I look up in time to see all the wonderful folks in the next room staring straight into mine. There I am, pants/boxers down to the knees, bent over holding on to the bed and the doctor shining a flashlight up my butt. I can only imagine what was going through their minds. Thankfully the exam is very quick and again showed no signs of anything out of place/abnormal.

Of course the more they find normal with me the more I start to worry that the problem is further up and they cannot see it without a scope. It was right in the middle of thinking this when the doctor starts to explain anal fissures to me and how with all my answers to the questions and the physical exam are most likely the cause of my problems. He gave me a prescription to help heal them, if that is what they are and then we talked about my diet.

Since I started my long road down pain management I have known about the long term effects of narcotics on the body. They can cause constipation far worse then any Thanksgiving dinner ever has and since the medication is a daily thing you have to really be mindful of your diet or you will constantly have a problem. While I am eating plenty of "roughage" and even adding fiber supplements I am still having some problems which in turn are causing the bleeding (they believe). With that in mind the doctor asked me if I have ever taken Flax seed meal. Of course I have not so the doctor explained it all to me letting me know that it not only adds fiber to the diet but it has some of the oils your body needs which in turn help with going to the bathroom.

With my ER visit over and prescription in hand we set out to find some of the flax meal. Of course living in the area I do it is not so easy to find so it looks like I will need to run down to the city. I am sure that Whole Foods will have it and then I can buy enough to last for some time. I also need to find some recipes for it, I was thinking that rather then just eating it straight I could bake it into cookies/cake or something like that.

While the ER visit did not turn up anything abnormal it does not mean I am content to say that all is fine. With the advice of the ER doc and some information I took from some medical websites I have made an appointment with my personal physician to look a bit "deeper" as it were into the cause of the bleeding. My hopes are that the doctor is correct, it is just the anal fissures.