It’s incredible to me the things that people will do for “beauty” and “health.” I never thought I would see the day where I would pay a complete stranger $80 to stick a long tube up my ass while I reclined on my back, with my butt hanging over a molded plastic basin with a drain to catch the electrolyte-infused water, and of course, the resulting massive quantities of excrement. It was as if I had not taken a shit in the entire twenty-three years of my existence. And to think that some people fetishize this…

I admit, I gave in to the alternative medicine hype. After experiencing IBS for my entire life, I felt something more than “natural laxatives” (read: sperm enemas) had to be done. Two years ago I went a full month without what my hydrotherapist calls “release.” It was only at that point that I started to explore the possibilities, and it was only at that point that I came to the realization that most people shit once a day, and that it is considered unhealthy to do less than that. I was generally lucky to strain over the pot once a week. The idea that people did this every day without giving them flaming hemorrhoids was, well, shocking. Almost frightening. As someone completely adverse to all bodily fluids and solids, having to deal with shit any more than once a week was absolutely appalling. I can’t even look in a clean, empty toilet without feeling my stomach turn. The past month, however, has lead me to have to at least metaphorically look my shit in the eye. (Oh my god, my shit has eyes?)

With the help of Zelnorm, my waist had returned to 28”, a measurement it had not seen since I was 10. My body may always have been hourglass, but I have huge tits and birthing hips, so standard bloating was hardly noticeable. When my medical insurance stopped covering my miracle girl pills, however, my stomach quickly barreled out to an amazing 30” at the top and 36” at the bottom. Good lord, you don’t want to know. My bikinis were stashed away and the larger corsets were brought back out, to no avail. Liquid diets didn’t help. Living solely on fiber, water and laxatives did nothing. Something had to be done, and fast, as I could no longer fit into any of my trousers any longer.

Colonics. What a concept. Pay a stranger to give your colon an uber-enema, evacuating not just the lower digestive tract but the upper as well. But no, that would be too easy, and far too expensive. The other, far more masochistic approach seemed like a far better idea: colon hydrotherapy, whereupon a tube forces six gallons of water into your rectum, and then, unlike in colonics where a vacuum tube carries the waste back out, you then force the waste and the water out with your own muscles. Brilliant! And with a savings of $70 per session, what could be better?

My therapist turned out to live and operate out of a communal house that he shares with Buddhist monks and long-haired hippies in tie-dye, no exaggeration. I crave the ability to find a place where I can receive acupuncture, yoga lessons, herb tea concoctions, and full system enemas without being treated to lectures on spirituality, karma, and peace in my relationships. Does such a place exist? Over and over again I read that you cannot have the physical benefits without also healing your soul. Ying and yang, and that sort of thing. Prayer and meditation and an overabundance of incense. I hate incense. I like being a piss and vinegar, cynical far before my time, society hating, family loathing, indulging in ice cream and arguments with my lover, angst ridden adult. I’m not bitter anymore, okay? I admit that was a problem. But I like my anger and my critical approach to life, so leave it alone and let me do my lotus, okay? Stop telling me to picture open fields with birds flying over head, because that is not calming to me, that only makes me think the birds are going to take a giant, diarrhea induced crap on me. It’s happened before, and lord almighty, it’ll likely happen again if you tell me I need to go on a self-realization tour in the backwoods of West Virginia, and by the way, that’ll cost me $1200 for two days of inhaling hippie stink and fasting among the wild blueberries. Are you people insane? I think so. Yes. I think so. I haven’t spent tens of thousands of dollars on therapy and spent thousands of hours writing to still have not come to a state of self-actualization, and once in that state I realized that if I just stopped fighting my own twisted personality I would actually be content with at least one thing in life – myself. I might not like humanity, but I like myself, and that’s a hell of a lot better than not liking either, so take your “embrace the world, heal thyself” crap out of my face and leave me in my own personal idea of peace and happiness. Thanks.

The above being said, at least internally, I decided there was no reason to not take the physical benefits while the opportunity was there, and allow the drivel about living on a diet of legumes so that my body will stop menstruating go in one ear and out the other. Grant me the grace to not hurt New Age health fanatics.