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the straight poop

JonesCarpeDiem
4 13 96

decisions have been made and I didn't even know.

I got a call yesterday wanting me to schedule a date for a procedure.

I didn't even know we'd decided what we were doing. I haven't had the cat scan yet or the second meeting with the surgeon to set a date.

I sent a list of questions to the surgeon after our first meeting.

They were about outcome and quality of life

      Quality of life as in what you gain when you quit smoking. You won't even realize it until you have it. 

Freedom is what I'm speaking of.

      The surgeon had called to tell me she could not  answer my questions in writing through the portal due to time constraints but I missed her call. I'm still waiting for the CT scan and I was to tentatively meet with her on the 16th after my cat scan.

Her plan was to surgically remove my cecum and part of my large intestine.

The cecum is the mixing pot where the liquid from your small intestine gets mixed with bacteria to make solid waste.

      The call about the procedure was so out of the blue. It was my gastro's office, not the surgeon.

      I was caught off guard so I explained what I knew to that point and began asking questions. They transferred me to a nurse who found numerous messages between the surgeon and my gastro who has worked on my esophagus for 6 years. Together, they decided he will remove the polyp endoscopically and, do it in 3 stages, 3 months apart.

This will all be outpatient.

      It's amazing to me what computerization has done in that the nurse was actually able to read their communications to convey their thought process to me,

      So, I'm not going to be a foot shorter, but I likely would have had I not voiced my concerns.

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About the Author
Hello, My name is Dale. I was quit 18 months before joining this site and had participated on another site during that time. I learned a lot there and brought it with me. I joined this site the first week of August 2008. I didn't pressure myself to quit. HOW I QUIT I didn't count, I didn't deny myself to get started. When I considered quitting (at a friends request to influence his brother to quit), I simply told myself to wait a little longer. No denial, nothing painful. After 4 weeks I was down to 5 cigarettes from a pack a day. The strength came from proving to myself, I didn't need to smoke because I normally would have smoked. Simple yes? I bought the patch. I forgot to put one on on the 4th day. I needed it the next day but the following week I forgot two days in a row I put one in my wallet with a promise to myself that I would slap it on and wait an hour rather than smoke. It rode in my wallet my first year.There's nothing keeping any of you from doing this. It doesn't cost a dime. This is about unlearning something you've done for a long time. The nicotine isn't the hard part. Disconnecting from the psychological pull, the memories and connected emotions is. :-) Time is the healer.