A regular reader named "Iphigenia" sends this medical update (Editor's note: we welcome your medical stories at all times; please send to the curator of this site):

ENEMAS: A LOVE STORY
OR
PUBLIC ENEMA #1
OR
MY ENEMA STORY

Yesterday I had an appointment with a gastroenterologist. But before I left my apartment to venture out into yesterday's snowstorm, I thought to myself: I'm so sick of winter, I'm so sick of this nice large purse I've been carrying around all winter, it's time for a change — I'll use this smaller purse, this burgandy-fur-and-ostritch purse, my stuff will just barely fit in, but I'll feel so much happier. So off I go to the gastroenterologist, with my tiny purse.

At the end of my appointment, the doctor writes me two prescriptions and hands them to me across his big wooden desk. Then he says, "Let me give you some samples." I start to quake in my chair. These prescriptions are not for little pills. Or even big pills. Or pills at all. They are for things that get retained in the lower colon.

We walk out to the inner reception desk, and I am parked in that spot while he retrieves my gifts. This is a busy medical office, and it has two reception areas, a very large waiting room, and alot of people who work there and who are seen by the doctors in the practice, mostly GPs. There are many people milling about while I wait.

Out pops the doctor. He hands me two small boxes containing bullet shaped things. Check. I can stuff those in my coat pocket. Phew. Then he hands me a large white box with blue lettering on it. Some of the lettering on it says, ENEMA. Some of it says, FOR RECTAL USE ONLY. And on one side, there is a large, life-sized drawing of the bottle contained within, a pictogram, as if meant for people who don't speak english, to make sure they don't drink it, I assume. Its the size of a bottle of beer, but with a distinctive shaped tip.

Are you feeling my humiliation yet? Are you sensing that I really shouldn't have switched purses that day?

There is one more added humiliation. After getting the damn thing home, and opening it up to take a look, it turns out that the doctor gave me a sample of Expired Enema, as of January 2002.

So it was really all about *pointless* humiliation.