Colonoscopy fear! Diet and prep tips please

[kissmelittleass]

Due to have a colonoscopy on Friday afternoon, very scared!! Fear of the unknown!!
I have Plenvu prep to take at 6pm Thursday evening and again at 6am Friday morning. I have to eat light apparently on Thursday and stop all food intake from 3pm Thursday ( not looking forward to being hungry)
Are there any tips to make this all a bit easier? Should I start eating a bit lighter from today does that make it any easier?
The leaflet said to stop any iron medication from today and to avoid seeds nuts legumes from today.
I'm vegetarian so some things I usually eat are out, also any experiences on the actual procedure itself would be great to know.
I had a sigmoidoscopy in November as I was in hospital at the time and that was just an enema before hand and obviously no prep or diet changes.

I would eat normally until you have to stop.

Use vaseline on your bumhole from the first toilet visit, don't wait until you're sore first.

Use tena nappies to give you a bit of extra time to get to the toilet and to get to and from the hospital. The urge to go doesn't bugger off when you're empty.

Have some yummy food in for when you get home. Anything you want. I felt well bruised inside the next day so a sofa day might be in order if you do as well.

Good luck, the preps the worst part imo.

*obviously cutting out what they've said though.

Eat normally until told to stop except for things that might get stuck on the bowel.
Use sudocrem on your anus from before the very first bit of prep, all of that wiping will make you sore and that is often worse than the passing stools and fluid.

You can have clear liquids whilst you are fasting, I had some marigold vegetable bouillon as a drink and also you can have jelly sweets (and probably the veggie versions) but not red or black.

The colonoscopy is not much worse than a sigmoidoscopy especially if you are having sedation but it is sometimes difficult to get the scope around some of the bends and you may be asked to move to ease this.

The prep is definitely the worst bit, just when you think you surely must be empty, you find you're not.

I sent dh to the shop to get moisturising baby wipes after dashing to the loo a few times and realising loo roll was too rough. I kept a pack of nappy sacks next to the loo to put the used ones in.

Yes to Vaseline from the start.

I drank clear liquids and a lot of miso soup from when I had to stop solids.

The prep tastes unpleasant so I bought my favourite mango squash to mix in with it.

The colonoscopy itself was easy, you laugh when you see the paper pants you wear but I have no memory of the actual procedure other than the sedation going in. So I have no idea if I made any noises from my backside and neither the doctor or the Gp intimated I'd done so.

DH had a colonoscopy last week.

He is a really big eater and always hungry but he managed fine in terms of hunger and everything really.

He used Sudocream and vaseline on his bum and seemed to be forever on the loo beforehand. He had gas and air during the procedure as he didn’t want to be sedated and took a picnic to have in the car on his way home (hospital 45-50 minutes away). He also had a lot of gas and was still experiencing a need to go to the loo a lot the night of the surgery and the next morning. But overall he said it was ok and wasn’t too bad.

Drunk the plenvu with squash to disguise the taste, make sure you have access to a toilet quickly, if you have more than one in your house tell others not to use one. I’ve always taken all the sedation and found it quite sore afterwards as they took biopsies and was full of gas. It’s not pleasant but will be over before you know it

I had one recently - definitely have sedation and you wont know anything. Second things to help with a sore bum and treats for afterwards. I wAs surprised how tired i was for up to 3 days afterwards. Good luck.

Agree with taking all the sedation. I even remind my consultant to give me all he’s got when we get to theatre!

I usually lighten my diet a few days in advance. I don’t really get hungry during prep as you’re consuming so much liquid.

Take it easy afterwards. I went straight to McDonalds after my first and the cramps were unreal! Lesson learned!

I am nervous about any procedure that has to be undertaken. The worst thing about your procedure is the bowel prep beforehand. I would have your iPad to hand so you can read it when you are on the loo. It was a lot less painful than I expected and I would not dread having one again if I had to x

My key pieces of advice are as follows;

Make sure someone drives you home in case you need to shit yourself stop for the toilet easily.

As the effects of the laxative last for at least a day after the procedure, don't eat anything spicy or full of fibre or you too will have to slam the phone down on a conference call and sprint to the bathroom whilst keeping your bum shut

Other than that it's not that bad, as PPs have said, make sure you have plenty of sudocrem and vaseline and stick to the rules around what you can and can't eat.

Thank you to everyone who replied 🙏🏻 great idea about the Vaseline I actually bought some last week so will be applying that from my first toilet trip!!
Also will get some soft baby wipes as suggested, the instructions on the plenvu say to drink the prep slowly over 30 MINUTES and then drink 500ml of liquid BUT my hospital leaflet says to drink slowly over an HOUR and then drink 500ml of additional liquid like water ?? So which do I do 30 minutes or an hour??
The first prep is at 6pm Thursday and the second at 6 am Friday morning.

Also any food ideas on what to eat lightly the day or two before?

Oh I do feel for you, I had one list before last Christmas. Just to say, the procedure itself isn’t nearly as bad as I’d anticipated! Yes there are the odd uncomfortable moments but on the whole it’s ok, nothing you won’t be able to manage I am sure! I’m afraid I can’t remember the advice for the prep ‘drink’, I only remember being so relieved that I could eat jelly sweets! I’m vegan so get a nice selection of strawberry laces/jellybeans etc to give you some energy & something to. Good luck, hope it all goes well

‘Something to look forward to’ was what I meant to type. Veggie jelly sweets make everything better after all!

@VVKills27 Thanks jelly sweets sound good!

I've had a colonoscopy in mainland Europe (under GA there as that's the norm). For 3 days before, they get you to eat a very light, low residue diet, and I think that make the bowel prep way easier, i found it fine, much less unpleasant than expected. I had pasta, cheese, white rice, a few potatoes, crumpets, white bread, eggs and best of all, a treat from the 70s - some findus frozen cheese pancakes!

Best of luck with it all

Non fibrous foods beforehand - I am veteran of colonoscopies and can still remember the one where they found a tiny bit of carrot in a crevice of my bowel - I’d last eaten carrots 5 days before and it had survived the extremely violent crapping.

It doesn’t really matter how quickly you drink the prep- it tastes vile so can take a while. Drinking it chilled helps- I usually make mine up and keep in the fridge and then take small glasses out. It works by sucking all the liquid in your body into your bowel to them expel at high velocity, so make sure you are well hydrated beforehand and it’ll be over sooner - eventually you will literally be crapping high powered jets of slightly coloured water.

The colonoscopy itself is fine - in fact if they give you fentanyl it’s LOVELY. I absolutely understand why people get addicted to opioids after having that. I can’t remember my first one, but after that they’ve given me the drugs that make everything lovely but keep you awake so I’ve watched my insides on the screen lots of times and it’s quite fascinating - especially when you watch them take biopsies and see the tiny cut but can’t feel a thing

Great info thanks 👍 I can do mash cheese and eggs bu I've no idea what to have for breakfast (vegetarian) I was going to start the light low fibre eating from tomorrow.
I haven't opened my bowels today and only had a few balls of constipated movement yesterday and the day before so will be kind of glad in a funny way to get it all out once I take the prep on Thursday!!

I started to eat white foods a few days before, pasta etc. Then the day before the prep I ate rice Krispes only lol sounds weird I know. The prep said for morning appointments u took the prep the day before at 6am and 6pm and for afternoon appointments 6pm and 6am on the day of the appointment. I had and afternoon appointment but I took the prep as if I had a morning appointment so that most of it was out by the next day (I was so scared of crapping my pants)

Top tip... don't be scared to fart loads afterwards the pain from where they pump the gas is horrible, the nurse really encouraged me to fart including rubbing my back for me bless her.

You've had good advice there OP!

Definitely keep food fibre free for a couple of days before. Both times I've had it I've worried excessively about my output not being clear enough etc but it was fine both times.

Agree that the drugs are great and you won't remember much 😄

In fact worrying the most recent time I had one, when I was getting ready to be discharged the nurse was saying Oh you must be feeling quite uncomfortable at the moment, all full of gas...but actually I didn't at all. Not even a tiny bit. I felt perfectly fine and gas free.

WHEN DID I DO ALL THE FARTING?? 😱😱😱😱

@crazyhairbear crikey I didn't think about the farting 😂 the embarrassment

@😂 blimey!

@MostIneptThatEverStepped