Well I've had my endoscopy this morning and thought I would share how it went and what it's like.
I'll be honest, it's not the most pleasant experience but it really isn't that bad either.
I opted for just the throat spray rather than sedation as I need to drive tomorrow and with sedation you can't drive for 48hrs.
Once in the room, the doctor asked me a couple of questions then I was straight onto the bed lying on my left side. A nurse popped a mouth guard in with a hole for the tube and the doctor just went straight to it.
I will be honest, the tube was bigger than I imagined. I thought it would be something like a USB cable in size with the camera a bit bigger but it's not. It's quite a bit wider and not that flexible (but obviously flexible enough).
Now to dispel some of the fears you may have. You can breath perfectly normally all the time throughout. You can't really be sick because your stomach is empty as you can't eat for at least 6-8 hours beforehand. It did make me gag slightly but only twice and it made me burp a few times as well as dribbling and the camera was fully down in about 20-30 seconds. The whole process took about 2 minutes from start to finish. Pulling the camera out was dead easy and was one smooth motion hardly noticed.
They blew air into my stomach so the doctor could see better but I didn't feel it or know at all until they told me what they had done.
Anyway, my results were perfectly normal. Not even the slightest bit of inflammation which on one hand is good but it also means I'm not much closer to finding out what's causing this so back to the doctors next week.
I imagine if you are having the sedation you won't notice a thing but if I had to have another one I would still only go with the throat spray even knowing what it's like.
The back of my throat is sore now kind of like a scratchy feeling but other than that I'm fine.
Hope this helps others who may need one and as with most things in life, the fear is far worse than the actual thing itself.
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