Today, Julian was kind enough to drop my stool ^[1] sample off at LifeLabs.

Not long after, I get a call from the folks at LifeLabs telling me that they do not process that kind of stool sample kit any more, and that I need to come back and pick up the new kit that they DO process.

And I am thinking, what the fuck? I got that kit from the hospital yesterday. How can it be obsolete? Where did that nurse who handed it to me even find the damned thing?

Because I can’t be the first person to encounter this problem if it’s the hospital’s fault. If they have a whole stack of these ancient poop kits somewhere, and have been blithely handing them out for any length of time, then surely someone would have noticed that none of the kits they handed out ever produced a report. Right?

At least I hope someone would have noticed.

But what does that leave me with? The theory that this one nurse somehow hadn’t gotten the memo on the new kit and also had one of the old kits stashed away?

It is a vexing and perplexing mystery.

For that matter, why doesn’t the hospital lab do that kind of thing? What, they can processing my blood, urine, sputum, and every other bodily fluid but they draw the line at literally putting up with people’s crap?

Hmmm. Actually, the pragmatic portion of my brain has pointed out that they can’t have people taking up space in the ER waiting till they need to poop. And that hospital labs are not set up to take in samples from random patients.

I have to admit, my brain is right on that score.

But that still doesn’t explain how I ended up with an expired poop kit.

Anyhow, now I have to go through the whole stool sampling routine all over again, only this time all I have to do is take a swab.

Presumably directly from the material in question when it’s in its usual receptacle.

I’m not going to be any more explicit than that. Figure it out.

So at least this time it won’t be nearly as gross as the first time. That other time, a special receptacle was involved, and a tiny spoon, and…. yeah.

But it still annoys me that I have to deal with my feces again. There is a reason our entire toilet system is designed to minimize the time we have to spend dealing with that end of things (so to speak). Poop is nasty stuff!

But oh well. I have that certain feeling of uncomfortable fullness so I guess I had better read the instructions then go get this shit (ha) done.

Oh well, at least my poops are firming up. I hope to be back to normal poopage soon!

More after the break.

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The news from here

No clear idea of what to write about. I seem to be in one of my lean periods where I don’t get ideas along those lines for a little while.

Ergo, I am forced to fall back on my default strategy of babbling about whatever and seeing what crops up.

First off, what I hope to be the last poop update for a while : things are back to normal. Had a perfectly ordinary bowel movement earlier. Huzzah.

And I will be through with the damned antibiotic, Cephalexin, after the dose accompanying tomorrow’s lunch.

And good goddamned riddance. The digestive side effects, while not serious, were not good either. Diarrhea, like I have said before, can come with some very nasty side effects as your body struggles to maintain homeostasis while losing fluids and electrolytes and trace minerals in a very weird way.

And well, it made me poop the bed. Twice. I take that kind of thing personally.

That said, if I get prescribed it again, I will of course take it. I am not such a fool as to gainsay a doctor when it comes to what antibiotic works against a particular bug.

Whether or not I need a water pill is another thing entirely. I was prescribed some furosemide as well, supposedly to help with the feeling of heaviness in my lungs.

For those who do not not know, “water pill” is a cute euphemism for “diuretic”, which is a drug that helps ride your body of excess fluids by making you pee a lot.

So it makes you “make water”, as they used to call urination back in the days of Swift. Hence water pill.

Like I said…. cute.

But I already pee a lot, and honestly the pill is only tangentially indicated for reducing fluid in the lungs, so to hell with it.

I think the doctor only prescribed it to shut me up anyhow.

And who knows, maybe some day I will be feeling extremely bloated and waterlogged and I will give the stuff a try.

Then again, give that the potential side effects include hearing loss and photosensitivity, um maybe not.

I mean, this is Lasix we are talking about. That shit is dangerous. That’s not something you just toss at someone casually like it’s fucking aspirin.

Honestly, this lowers my opinion of Doctor Handsome a little.

I really should not read the list of side effects of any medication I am taking. It always freaks me out and threatens to awaken my long dormant hypochondria.

Last bit of poop news : The new stool sample kit is WAY more complicated to use than the old one.

And get this : it expects me to put a layer of Saran Wrap over my toilet, between the lid and the inner rim, and poop onto THAT.

Ummmmmm…. no. I still have the oddly hat-shaped but eminently more practical cardboard receptacle that came with the obsolete kit, and I will use that.

And the new kit also demands that I get the sample to them the same day that it is obtained, so I have to wait till tomorrow to retrieve it.

They even want me to put the time of collection plus my name and health care number on the specimen jar AND the paperwork myself.

Clearly, this system is based on what is most convenient FOR THEM.

And all to investigate the off chance that I have c. difficile.

Well if I had known how “difficile” the procedure would be, I might have told the doctor to skip it.

That’s the news from here. This is your faithful correspondent, signing off.

I will talk with you nice people again tomorrow.