The Colonoscopy as Tempo of Mortality
By Ben Fulton
April 10, 2026
Most people fortunate enough to have health and dental insurance know the drill: general physicals are annual, with dental check-ups landing every six months. Then there is the colonoscopy, a ritual of short-term starvation and gastrointestinal disruption necessary every five years for people with a family history of colon cancer and a track record of polyps removed during past colonoscopy procedures.
I recently finished my fifth colonoscopy, and it was as arduous as ever. My first procedure was, of course, the most discomfiting, if only because it was so new to the bowels. The order of pills, before and just after ingesting seemingly endless glasses of GaviLyte solution—an explosive (literally) combo of polyethylene glycol and electrolytes—was an assault both on the senses and my sense of shame. For two days the bathroom became a second home. This was just as well, since visits to the kitchen were made pointless. The sole point is scrubbing the bowels for a clear view of any pre-cancerous polyps. It is cliché that our eyes are the window to the soul. Anyone who has endured a colonoscopy can tell you the more apt metaphor is not a metaphor at all. The soul knows damned well when it is hungry. It knows thanks to our gastrointestinal system. There is no substitute.
My first gastrointestinal doctor called himself “The Gut Whisperer,” but his happy-go-lucky attitude was steeled by a sense of frank pragmatism when I informed him during a first consultation that my mother died of colon cancer. More precisely, she died because of a lackluster colonoscopy that failed to inspect the topmost portion of her large bowel. “That won’t happen under my careful eye,” he assured me. “Just be sure to get this done every five years until you die.”
And so I have. And perhaps because of this, 25 years and five procedures later, I am still alive.
There is a strange, slow rhythm of life between every procedure. The five years between procedures is not so much a blessed pause as it is a long reflection. The approach of each successive procedure at year four brings both a reminder of mortality and also the memory of my mother. That may be a strange case of association for a procedure that turns your hind end into a blasting trumpet of foul discharge. But hear me out. What else is a caring, loving parent but someone who calls at the worst moment to occupy your time with unpleasantries? And not just mere unpleasantries, but unpleasantries that could save your life?
To write about all this in a bothersome tone is absolutely, as they say, a “First World problem.” But so too is colon cancer itself, as it strikes more and more young adults, and for reasons experts believe are probably due to the ever-encroaching role of microplastics and other environmental toxins surmounting the gates of our bodies’ defenses. It seems more likely than not that increasing numbers of people will be dancing in time to scheduled colonoscopies.
Five years. That allotment sounds like a breather, but in fact is not. The plastic jug of GaviLyte is the bell that tolls for me, and also perhaps for thee. Therefore, send not to know. Just be sure your bowels are as clean as the kitchen floor you walk across barefoot every morning. Life is full of surprises, and we never know what the gastroenterologist might find.
