I have a colonoscopy tomorrow.

I am not having it done because there is anything wrong or because of anything anyone is worried about. I have simply reached that age where one is supposed to have some kinds of tests done periodically. I am a little overdue, actually. The doctor started making noises about this a couple of years ago. My focus at the time was on Jane’s health–and since the test was routine I saw no harm in holding off on it.

But subconsciously I may have been avoiding the test. I had one done a dozen years ago. It was not a pleasant experience.

Despite the lack of symptoms–despite the fact the test is just routine–I am still a little on edge today. And it isn’t merely the “cleansing” of the bowel in preparation that has me nerved up. There are so many cancers that hide so well that we do not know they are there until they are a serious problem. That was the way it was with Jane’s NET.

I remember a story Jane told me about the days when she was a lab technician in an area hospital. One day this guy came in for routine blood work. What she saw when she looked under the microscope was stunning. The blood cells were all wrong. The man was dying. And he had had no clue.

We all have stories like that: the person who discovers they have some fatal illness that has come out of nowhere. We have all heard the stories about people getting a clean bill of health and dropping dead of a heart attack in the parking lot not ten minutes later.

Some people avoid going to the doctor on the theory that as long as they don’t know there is anything wrong they will continue to be OK. Other people go to the doctor every time they sneeze. I’m not sure I buy either theory.

Medicine is currently an inexact science. We don’t have the means to detect every disease–let alone cure them all. It is a work in progress. A generation ago nearly any cancer diagnosis was a death sentence. Today, some still are.

But we are making progress. What we have learned about NET and CS in the last year will make a huge difference in the life expectancies of many patients. But we are still very much in the dark. We have nothing yet that looks like a cure for those with advanced forms of the disease. Only when it is caught really early do we have a shot at eradicating it in a patient. And catching it that early really only happens by accident at this stage.

Every six months they check me for skin cancer. Every six months they check my cholesterol. Every year they do a full blood panel to check my pancreas, my liver, my kidneys and whatever other organs they can monitor that way. Every year I get a full physical to make sure everything else is working as it should. Every few years they do a stress test on my heart. Every few years now they will do a colonoscopy.

Will they absolutely catch everything before it becomes an issue? No. But it will give them–and me–a fighting chance.