First Contact

Recently the girly told me of a procedure her brother would have to go through which involved a fiber-optic camera being fed up his urethra. This brought out a cringe and stirred up memories that are confusing to say the least.

When I was seventeen I had to have an operation to repair a herniated disc in my lower back. The surgery went well but there was a slight complication that arose. For those who have not had surgery you may not realize that they feed you drugs through an IV that keep you from defecating on yourself or urinating during the procedure. The last thing you need is for a doctor to throw up in your incision because of your recent taco dinner night.

Awaking afterward I kept myself in a semi-conscious to completely unconscious state with my self controlled morphine drip. Later I was forced to rely on the whimsies of the nursing staff and my claim that the pain was always a 10 on a scale going up to 10. Eventually they just gave me what was probably standard.

So about a half a day or more later they announced that I needed to urinate. I awkwardly rolled out of bed and shuffled, supremely unconcerned about my ass (or seat) on display for all, and tried to pee. No dice. This didn't really bother me but it was a concern for the nursing staff. They informed me that if I couldn't go by their next check they would have to insert a catheter. No pressure right?

The time came and I tried. I tried really hard. My face was probably a light shade of plum. In desperation I thought of Niagara Falls, lemonade, gurgling brooks and tidal movements in oceans in an attempt to coerce my bladder into releasing. The son of a bitch wouldn't mind. I was going to have to have a catheter inserted.

A young nurse or student, maybe 23 to 25, came in to perform the task. Here's something you should know: up to that point, nobody had even seen my penis in adult life, let alone touched it. Yeah, late bloomer, shaddup. When she lifted up my toga, as I like to think of it, and exposed my nether-regions to cold sterile hospital air, it was a bit awkward to say the least. Then she grasped the little guy, preparing him for insertion. As this was his first time being coddled he got a little happy. "OH MY FUCKING GOD, I'M GETTING A BONER" is all I could think. In my panic I threw images into my brain of baseball, old women, broken toes, puppies, melanoma and just anything without an erotic trigger. It kind of worked as I stopped at about 3/4 all the way to full mast.

The nurse kind of coughed, I assume trying not to laugh, and said "now, um, I need you to try and relax." I snapped "I AM trying to." After all I had just had back surgery, I was exposed and being handled by a stranger, and I was about to have a tube shoved up my urethra. Misery seemed so apt a description. That is until the tube began going in. Had I known the word at the time (thanks, Zeep!), I would describe the rest as a nadir. If forced to guess I'd say the tube was approximately 47 feet long. Once it stopped being fed in it was just frighteningly disconcerting. My bladder was allowed to unburden itself of one and a half large IV bags or so of urine. So I guess it was necessary.

Now every time I hear the words "catheter" or "urethra" I shudder, but I also think of the first time the little guy was seen and held. Since then I've become much more fond of baseball, love puppies more than ever, and have a strong attraction that borderlines on fetish for women who wear scrubs. As I said, its a confusing track of thought.