My husband Hal was a precocious little boy. He learned to read early and he loved science. His parents had received from a friend an old set of Encyclopedia Britannica volumes and he discovered the section on human anatomy. It fascinated him. His sight-reading ability was not quite up to the level of anatomical vocabulary, but he did the best he could, coming to his own unique pronunciation of certain words.
At dinner one night, he informed
his parents that the food they were eating was going down their episcopagus
to get to their stomach. The word delighted them and they adopted it. For the
next couple of years none of the members of the Thomas family had an esophagus.
They each had an espicopagus (pronounced e-pis-co-PA-gus).
Years later I wrote a poetry book
for my grandkids based on actual funny things they or their parents said when
they were kids. Here’s the poem about their Grandpa’s hilarious
mispronunciation:
MY FAITHFUL EPISCOPAGUS
Yes, of course, I love my lips!
My belly button gives me flips!
I like my feet,
my eyebrows are neat,
and my little toe is really sweet,
but the body part I like the best
is my faithful episcopagus!
So sing up high, sing way down low!
Sing for your supper, but eat it slow.
And all of your days,
give high praise
for your faithful episcopagus!
It’s hidden
inside me, after my mouth,
behind my throat, but further south.
It’s long and round,
and without a sound
it carries my food, every pound,
‘til it lands in my tummy a while to rest.
Oh, my faithful episcopagus!
So sing up high, sing way down low!
Sing for your supper, but eat it slow.
And all of your days,
give high praise
for your faithful episcopagus!
It carries jelly beans, spinach and peas.
It transports mango sauce and cheese,
all of my lunch,
my breakfast and brunch,
the yummy granola I love to crunch.
There’s none to compare in all the west
to my faithful episcopagus!
So sing up high, sing way down low!
Sing for your supper, but eat it slow.
And all of your days,
give high praise
for your faithful episcopagus!
Had enough?
I’ve had a different adventure
recently involving my esophagus. For several years I’ve had trouble swallowing.
I coughed and gagged frequently and had trouble sleeping with all the phlegm
and other stuff coming up. I usually ended up spending the night in a recliner
with my head raised.
This started during Covid and the
medical people I could get to online misdiagnosed allergies, sinus problems,
gastric reflux and other common maladies. They recommended a variety of over-the-counter
remedies, none of which worked. I’m sure people began suspecting me of being a
hypochondriac and chronic complainer.
Then late last year my
primary-care-physician had me take a barium-swallow-test, and the two medical
technicians found my problem five minutes into the test. They showed me the
shadow on the X-ray and told me it was a large diverticulum (pouch) attached to
the top of my esophagus. I had thought diverticuli developed only in the colon
(where my husband harbors his), but no. They can also pop out on the esophagus.
I was glad to finally have a name for what was happening in my body. I had an
unfaithful episcopagus.
After the test, things happened
relatively quickly (I’ll spare you the details), and at the end of January I
had an operation on my esophagus. (To be medically precise, it was an
Endoscopic Zenkers Diverticulectomy. Is that not impressive?!) The end result
of it all is that I returned to normal. I can swallow again. The gaging is
gone. I can sleep lying down all night long.
Normal is good.
It’s good to know that, even as we
age, there are serious bodily ailments that can be fixed. In some areas of our
lives, normal is possible.
I thank God for modern medical
wonders, for non-invasive (though the mouth) procedures that were unthinkable
even a decade ago.
I thank God for normal.
In addition to that-----
I’ll sing up high.
I’ll sing down low.
And all of my days
I’ll give high praise
for my faithful episcopagus!
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