July 24th, 2019 was a historic day in the history of our country. On that day, millions of Americans were riveted to their televisions, watching Robert Mueller testify before Congress. Those who weren’t riveted to their TVs fell off and did their sleeping on the floor.

I, too, slept through Mueller’s testimony, which I admit to without embarrassment because I have a note from my doctor. I also have a new heart valve as well as a half a dozen sutures in my aorta. And my surgeon sent me email asking if I’d seen his wedding ring.

Missing Mueller’s testimony wasn’t the worst part of open heart surgery. That honor goes to waking up in intensive care. I’d have been more confident coming to in a room called you’re-going-to-be-just-fine care instead of one that sounds like a synonym for we-have-the-coroner-on-speed-dial.

There are two topics of conversation allowed in intensive care. One is how you feel and the other is how you feel about pooping.

Pooping is one of the most important things you can do after surgery. It demonstrates that the surgeon didn’t mistakenly implant your new heart valve into your small intestine. It also confirms there’s no chance you’ll miss your next colonoscopy.

In order to encourage you to poop, hospitals spare no expense to make your own, personal bathroom inviting, often devoting more square footage to the potty than you’re likely to find on a Greyhound bus.

Though not by much.

If you do poop there’s a real question about where it will fit. The good news is that if the toilet explodes they won’t have to look far for your remains, especially your wristband, which they’ll need in order to discharge you.

(FOR THE RECORD: Exploding toilets are not urban myths. A few weeks ago a woman in Port Charlotte, Florida reported that her toilet exploded during a thunderstorm. Instead of going to the bathroom that day, her bathroom came to her.)

Your path to pooping begins when the nurses get you out of bed and walking. This happens about six minutes before the painkillers wear off so when they do you’re unable to return the four feet to your room without crawling on your belly. It also dampens the urge to engage in lively poop banter.

I have always had a problem engaging in a rational discussion about poop, even with medical professionals.

(FOR THE RECORD: On my first day in intensive care, one of the nurses asked where I was from. I had to explain I was from my mother and father. Waking me at midnight to give me a sleeping pill shouldn’t make someone a medical professional.)

I blame this reluctance on an upbringing in which poop was routinely referred to as “grunts.” When my parents vowed their children would never want for anything they meant, “…and that includes therapy.” (FACT CHECK: Could I have made up “grunts?” Could you?)

Needless to say, my discussions about poop were quite short.

“Good afternoon, Mr. Douglas. Did we poop today?”

“Is it afternoon already?”

Each one of my nurses (two a day for six days for a total of three hundred seventy nine) had a pooping suggestion:

• drink water ( no need…that part was working overtime);
• exercise (with three drainage tubes in my chest cavity, not likely);
• eat beans (there’s nothing more frightening than a medical professional who hasn’t seen Blazing Saddles);
• eat prunes (it took ten minutes to get me out of bed and into the bathroom so I wasn’t interested in any solution that worked gently, naturally and unpredictably).

It didn’t take me long to figure out that pooping wasn’t a graduation requirement. I only had to SAY I pooped.

Unfortunately, the hospital thought of that, because I was not allowed out of bed unless I was accompanied by a nurse. The nurse didn’t follow me into the bathroom, but I’m sure she (or he) stood outside the door with a glass pressed to her (or his) ear. Medical professionals are trained to recognize the sound of poop hitting two quarts of water inside a porcelain bowl.

At least that’s what I read on the internet.

Also, the nurse told me not to flush the bowl after I pooped. Personally, I wouldn’t pay for a kid of mine to get a college education that included poop inspecting.

But I have to admit, rushing out of the bathroom like a two-year-old screaming, “I pooped,” took about seventy years off my life.

About the same as if the toilet had exploded.