Are you plagued with any health problems at all? The latest craze seems to be that the colon is the base for almost all problems and that all we have to do is cleanse it and our tummies will be flatter, we will poop more and better, and life will be jolly.

What's going on here? It used to be SEX that was dirty. Now sex is fine, but something has to be in need of purification I guess, and so the dirtiest thing we can think of is the poop chute. According to many self-proclaimed colon experts, the typical North American colon contains 5-10 pounds of impacted fecal material and this also causes malabsorption, causing people to be fat. I'm not sure how it got twisted into this.  Logically, actual malabsorption would cause people to be thin.

I hate to burst your bubble, boys and girls, but there is a lot of money to be made here and distortions are happening.  "Colon cleanse" products are being sold by the buttload, and not doing any good, and possibly doing harm either directly, or by distracting people from their real issues. 

Katie Couric did the public a huge favor by agreeing to have her personal colonoscopy videoed and put on youtube for everyone to see. Here it is for your viewing pleasure.  

In order to prep for a colonoscopy you have to first drink megadoses of purgative laxative that cleans your bowels out.  Pretty much everything that is in there comes out.  I speak from experience.  So if you had any "mucoid plaques" you would either poop 'em out or they would still be in there, (because only certified "colon cleanse" products can coax 'em out)  fair enough?   As you can see, Katie had nothing in her bowels that even remotely resembled the picture at the top of this hub, and neither did I, and neither does anyone else who undergoes a colonoscopy. 

In the light of all the colonoscopy evidence, the colon cleansing industry will have you believe that "regular" doctors don't know how to find mucoid plaques during colonoscopy and that the mucuos coating that covers the colon lining  as in this link is somehow a bad thing.  Do not get me wrong I am no fan of the USA health care system, but most doctors are well-meaning individuals of at least average intelligence and their eyes are as good as anyone's.   How they get from some mucous in the colon to those rubbery worm things is beyond me.  Another theory is that the plaques are actually in your small intestine where the colonoscopy does not go.  But people, the purgative comes in from the top!  It purges your ENTIRE gut.    

The logical theory of "mucoid plaques" is that they are the result from using the cleansing product   Many of these products contain bentonite (clay) psyllium (fiber) or some other source of fiber.  Bentonite clay is like plaster.  And psyllium swells up when it gets wet.  That's why you have to drink it quickly.  It seems like most of the people who claim pass these weird alien turds do so while under the influence of a "bowel cleanse" product.  So I put to you (and I am not the first one!)  that the mucoid plaques are an artifact of the cleansing process itself. 

I happened to have been given some "Intestinal Drawing Formula" by a well-meaning friend. I kept it because I thought someday I would try it, but every time I smelled that smell and thought about what it would do to me I said, uh, maybe next week or something.  I had always been curious about this stuff so I decided to try a rather non scientific test.   I   had some tubular plastic bags left over from a little backyard project I did. Hmmmmm.... What if I mixed up some of this goo, put it in a section of tube, poked many pinholes in the plastic to simulate the drying effect of the colon, and left it in the sun to dry? Well, friends, you can see the results of my experiement right here.  What the photographs can't show you is the consistency of this thing:  Let me assure you that it is QUITE RUBBERY and would not break apart like a normal turd.   Now I, too, have my very own mucoid plaque, only I didn't have to subject my body to weird substances to get it.  Would you want something like this coming out of you?  If not, don't put it in!  It's as simple as that.   I wonder if the colon cleanse companies would pay for this picture. 

Colonoscopy is an expensive somewhat invasive medical procedure and it is not without its own risks, which include perforation and bleeding.  Perforation during colonoscopy is a medical emergency that has been known to happen.   The guidelines for the point at which the benefits outweigh the risks, i.e. who should and should not have it and how often are based strictly on statistics.   Generally the accepted ages for getting one's first colonoscopy is 50, but younger people get them too if they have a history of ulcerative colitis or first degree relatives with colon cancer.  For example my sister came down with ulcerative colitis at age 19 and had to have colonoscopy done every year after that.   At 35  cancer was discovered and she had her entire colon removed.  But her colon was a problematic P.O.S. that didn't work very well anyway.   For most of the rest of us the colon is a very important useful organ that we should take care of by eating right and exercising. 

So if you're otherwise young and healthy don't rush out and get yourself a colonoscopy just to satisfy your curiosity.  Take it from those who have had them:  There is no such thing as mucoid plaques.  Eat a good diet and yes do deacidify your body, but don't get sucked into expensive colon cleanse regimens.