I’m no spring chicken and I’m afraid to die and all that, but I think my biggest worry about growing older, my cringiest fear is when some wobbly hospital intern on his first day has to insert a catheter in me. I’m squirming just writing this. Seriously.
So anyway, I’m watching television the other day, minding my own business. Or minding all the celebrities’ businesses because Showbiz Tonight is on, and they break for this commercial:
Ack! That had to be the longest 30 seconds of my life sitting through that! It might have even been a whole minute!
Granted, it’s not like they get all graphic about it or anything. They don’t have to. It’s like a Hitchcock movie, where the director has left the horror up to your imagination.
And you know how those cable networks only seem to sell ads to three companies so you have to watch the same commercial, like, forty-seven times in one evening?
Gahh!!!I can’t take it!
I’m such a wimp about medical procedures of any kind, I can’t even handle hearing about it. Just ask any of my friends who have witnessed me hit the Lyon’s Coffee Shop floor near the bathroom, or the tile near the ear-piercing booth at the Country Club Plaza shopping mall, or those two desktops on the way to the floor in my 9th grade sex-ed classroom during a film strip called something like: Your First OB-GYN Appointment.
Nope. Not kidding about that either.
I’m not saying catheters are a bad thing, I’m sure they’ve helped lots of people. And home catheters are “liberators”, like the commercial says (when they’re not repeating “catheter” over and over and uh….ohh…woozy).
Would you excuse me for just a minute? I need to go walk around the house and shake this off before I—
[PLOP!]
I thought I was the only one wondering about these Cath commercials! I was so excited to see this blog!! Completely weird, but as I was reading your original post a Liberator Medical Cath commercial actually came on! I couldn’t believe it! I see these commercials all the time and always wonder… who needs home catheters and who in the heck would need so many!? I always thought catheters were done in a hospital only. Anyways.. so glad I’m not alone!
How crazy is that…a commercial appearing as you read about it. Too funny!
That makes me uncomfortable too. I’d rather see ads for hummingbirds
and weight loss. I love those people who just call a phone number and
take a pill and don’t change their lifestyle at all and they drop 50
pounds. I don’t believe it, but I like seeing it.
[…] barrage of emails notifying me of new comments on Nanny Goat’s in Panties’ “Catheters Make Me Squirmy” post and thus reminding me of my own epically squirmy experience with catheters has been a […]
I’m not so bad when it comes to medical procedures, but those commercials get
me totally skeeved when they talk about REUSING catheters!! EEWWWWW!!!
That is just totally wrong. The thought of having to CLEAN them…. ooooo,
now I’m starting to get weak… PLOP, hi there, your floor is comfy!
Those commercials are just wrong on so many levels. And they bring back nightmares. Oh, yeah… I’ve been on the receiving end of those things more times than I’d like to remember. Oh crap… Now I’m remembering. PLOP!
I’m pretty sure I’m happy I DVR everything. I had prior knowledge of the catheter infomercials.
One of the things that I can’t believe about myself is that I have all kinds of gadgetry AND I watch a lot of movies, TV, Netflix streaming, OnDemand, and yet I do not have a DVR. Never have.
I envy you that.
Ok… as if I wasn’t freaked out enough about getting old now I am afraid of being catheterized? Ugh
I know. Sorry about that. Just know that the next time you see one of these commercials, someone will be cringing with you in spirit.
But, there’s little to no out-of-pocket cost! That should have made you feel all better!
I see your point and I realize everyone has their price, but…
Haven’t had much experience with cathaters except when I had my babies. I haven’t worried too much about it (until now) What I worry about is the day I would need Depends. I can spot a lady with a Depends on at 500 ft. I am thinking I need to invent a cool (as in stylish), thin, hip hugger version of adult diapers before I need one.
That’s the spirit! You’re thinking entrepreneurially (sp?). I guess I haven’t paid enough attention to realize if I could ever tell if someone was wearing Depends.
It made me squirm too. You must be watching the wrong channels or at the wrong time of day. In the UK, daytime TV often has ads for funeral plans, which is almost as bad. I’d much prefer a L’Oreal advert “because you’re worth it”.
I’m clearly watching the wrong channels at the wrong time because I also see a lot of phone sex commercials with porn star rejects in them.
Hahaha! I hear you. The only reason I know about catheters is because my dad had prostate cancer and ended up having to catheterize himself 2-3 times a day. Those catheters are ex-pen-sive! So I guess there’s a big market for ‘em! And… I didn’t pass out at the gyno when they gave me a shot to numb “my area” - I went into some catatonic physical shock where my body went into rigor, including my mouth, so I could only barely yell EUH! EUH! to try and get the doc and nurses back into the room while they were laughing and oohing and ahhing in the reception area at the box of jewelry I had brought in for them to look at (It was Christmas and I was working for a jeweler). Seriously. EUH! EUH! Just call me Lurch. They finally came back in the examination room and looked at me all rigor-ed up and laughed and said, “Man, don’t ever have a baby or you’ll be shit out of luck.” So, I never had a baby.
What the….???? Gawd, that sounds awful and scary. Is that really why you never had a baby? Cuz I’m telling you, for the first 15 years of my fertile phase, it was the fear of child labor and everything that goes with it that kept me from having kids (along with selfishness, career priorities, was never going to get married anyway, etc.) After that it was easy to get out of it by saying I was too old.
Nah. The truth is I never had the desire. I watched my friends from high school get pregnant and have kids and watched other friends who had an intense desire to have kids and I never felt that, not even once. My friends kept saying, wait ’til you’re 25, you’ll feel it. Nada. OK, wait ’til you’re 30… nada. I’m happy for everybody else who had kids but I have no envy. I’m really happy without them and after about 10 minutes with OPKs (Other People’s Kids), I’m running for the hills.
What channel was this on???
I have to be honest, I’m not sure. I could list off the probability based on what channels I watch most, but I just threw out CNN Headline News channel because that’s the first one I thought of.
You know, I would have to be realllly hard up for money to make one of those commercials. I think I’m too vain to ever pitch stuff like that- or all the other creepy, nasty stuff that shouldn’t be on the tv. I’m a wimp.
xo jj
And what if you get caught in conflicting commercials? One week it’s catheters and the next its pills for frequent urination. Boy, you’d never work in this town again.
What I don’ t get is, do people get these online and put them in themselves? What?? Plop!
Exactly! You and I would be no good together. We’d need a third just to hold us up.
OMG I so hear you. That’s just icky. I won’t say anything else so you don’t have to get all skeevy reading my post. There’s enough of that here as it is. {gag}
Love you anyway.
Shar
If I were king, I’d spend billions of dollars coming up with a more advanced way of handling this situation. That, and child labor.
Eeeewwww! I’ve never seen one of those catheter commercials. Although, I confess that when faced with a bedpan in the hospital, I was almost longing for a catheter. (Hey, I said ALMOST.)
I don’t know if this is true, but I assume it’s worse for women than men. And I can’t even say why without getting queasy. Uhhhh, must sit down.
hahaha! Got the visual loud and clear!
The part where the people talk about not having to ‘re-use’ catheters is the part that makes me throw up in my mouth a little.
Maybe THAT’S why they need 200 a month!
OMG - that’s right! The re-use comment. AUGHHH!!! Thank goodness I’m sitting down already.
Yeah, there is the commercial where the woman says she was tired of “boiling” her catheters, I dont want to go to her house for dinner!!!
And now you’ve got me squirming again - ewwwww!
I don’t like thinking about things like this either. Let alone watching commercials about it! YIKES.
I once had to help teach an old man how to self catheterize himself for home and that image is burned on my brain.
See? Even you saying THAT, innocent enough, and I just squirmed again. I’d recommend exposure therapy for myself if it wasn’t such a ridiculous idea.
OMG I thought it was just me. I really don’t like thinking about other women’s hoohas. The only thing I dislike more, is having to think about tubey things in women’s hoohas while I’m enjoying breakfast and the 178th re-airing of the 5th episode of season 2 of Angel at 7 a.m.
Yes! Thank you for that validation. And for cracking me up as usual, Mahala. Your “tubey things in women’s hoohas” phrase had made my day.
Yes! Thank you for that validation. And for cracking me up as usual, Mahala. Your “tubey things in women’s hoohas” phrase had made my day.
It occurs to me that I have an EMT story that would, by comparison, render you unconscious. Suffice it to say that sometimes one of the things that goes out the window in mild dementia is awareness of your own pain threshold, but not so much the inclination to DIY medical devices best left in the hands of professionals.
Related: I’ve been flashed by far more people over the age of 75 than any one person should.
I thank you, my consciousness thanks you, and my soft noggin thanks you for sparing me. I don’t know if I would never make it as an EMT, or if I would have eventually overcome all that queasy-inducing stuff, but I admire you and am glad so many of you are stronger than I in that department.
I’m sayin’, I’ve cringed at the very commercials!!! Ya can have your catheter supplies delivered to your home free of charge if ya qualify. Now I don’t know about ya’ll but this is one chick your not gonna find tryin’ to install a catheter!
Have a beautiful week sweetie free of anything close to plumbin’ issues! :o)
Oh, thank you, Nezzy and may I wish the same for you!
I’m sayin’, I’ve cringed at the very commercials!!! Ya can have your catheter supplies delivered to your home free of charge if ya qualify. Now I don’t know about ya’ll but this is one chick your not gonna find tryin’ to install a catheter!
Have a beautiful week sweetie free of anything close to plumbin’ issues! :o)
That makes me uncomfortable too. I’d rather see ads for hummingbirds and weight loss. I love those people who just call a phone number and take a pill and don’t change their lifestyle at all and they drop 50 pounds. I don’t believe it, but I like seeing it.
Thank you for your much more serene comment about hummingbirds and effortless weight loss. It helps takes my mind off of everyone else and their catheter stories.
That makes me uncomfortable too. I’d rather see ads for hummingbirds and weight loss. I love those people who just call a phone number and take a pill and don’t change their lifestyle at all and they drop 50 pounds. I don’t believe it, but I like seeing it.
The publicist said she would happily share her catheter stories with you if you wanted. Having been in the hospital a couple of times she was cathetered but she says she did not feel liberated….
It’s the coming out part that sucks she says…
The publicist said she would happily share her catheter stories with you if you wanted. Having been in the hospital a couple of times she was cathetered but she says she did not feel liberated….
It’s the coming out part that sucks she says…
Auuughhh! Oh God, now I’m really squirming. Mustn’t think about it mustn’t think about it mutsn’t….
There’s a coupla things in that commercial that make me feel uneasy. Admittedly-I don’t know a lot about ‘Catheters- The Home Game'; I only see the foleys they use at the hospital, but WHY WOULD YOU NEED 200 A MONTH?
The second thing is the company name. ‘Cause I’m familiar with a COMPLETELY DIFFERENT ‘Liberator’. And these two pieces of knowledge/visuals should in no way be combined. Ever.
That’s a good point. 200 a month sounds like a lot, but what would I know? In fact I know so little, I’m not sure what the “other” liberator is. But it sounds scary. Is it a vibrator or something? Sorry if I’m way off and that just sent you into some crazy tail spin because of my very inappropriate guess.
Its a, well, a piece of furniture, I guess you’d say, that enables certain heretofore difficult ‘angles’, for people who are not yoga gurus. (See ‘Meet the Fockers’ for elucidation) I can tell you from my years as a moving company surveyor that lots of people own them. Old people.
My grandma uses catheters, and you have to do it every three to four hours, so 200 isn’t really that crazy of a number…..but it does sound HUGE!
Man, I had to have a catheter during childbirth with my oldest because I had pre-eclampsia and after going through THREE HOURS OF PUSHING they look at me and say “Yeah, we’re going to have to ask you to leave that thing in for another 12 hours to make sure you don’t explode or something”.
There are days thinking about it makes me wonder how I found the strength to go on after having to talk with my now ex-MIL with a bag of my own tee-tee hanging out of my urethra.
So yeah, it is as bad as you think it would be. Maybe worse. Not as bad as thinking about how when you’re pregnant the baby is swimming in a bag of water made up mostly of his own wee inside your body though.
Sincerely,
Tracy
Nice touch at the end there, my friend. Just beautiful. This…is why I love you.
Also, what I didn’t think about ahead of time was how squirmy I was going to get reading everyone’s comments, so now I have THAT to worry about.