Worried about cervical cancer

[lorenza]

I'm 24 and I definitely know I have health anxiety - I had a big thing a few years back when I convinced myself I have HIV - which these boards helped a lot with! I've been having a bit of a bad year with my anxiety anyway and seeing that story about the 23 year old girl who died of cervical cancer really set me off the other day.

I went to uni in Scotland so I had a smear test when I turned 20 but I'm 24 now so obviously it's been longer than three years. I've convinced myself that either I've developed something terminal in that space of time, or that I've remembered it wrong and I never actually got the all clear when I had my first smear test.

Would just like some reassurance really - its starting to really affect my sleep as the thoughts of dying young just go round and round my head :(

[majdle]

Hi Lorenza,
I know where you´re coming from... But don´t worry. Just go and get a smear test to put your mind at peace. I go and have one each year and that´s how I completely killed that specific subspecies of my health anx. And yes, cervical cancer takes years to develop, so you can actually relax.

[popejoan]

Hello I totally understand your fears. Believe me, if your smear results weren't clear they would have sent a letter to you stating that you got high risk hpv or pre-cancerous cells. Hpv cause most of cervical cancers. I have high risk hpv in my cervix, had borderline cell changes, colposcopy and biopsy results confirmed that I don't have CIN (pre-cancerous cells) and the borderline changes were due to cervical endometriosis and now I'm back to 3 year routine ALTHOUGH I have high risk hpv so a gynaecologist thinks that even if you have high risk hpv you can't develop cancer in 3 years. You don't even know if you have hpv and you didn't mention any symptoms. Do you have bleeding after sex, pain during sex or smelly discharge? Please don't worry about cervical cancer it's preventable and most of the cervical cancers are caused by hpv. If you're too scared have another smear test and if you're sexually active, use condoms. Hope this helps x

[bingjam]

I'm in England and we aren't aloud to hve a smear test until we are 25... We can't even request to have one!

Even with all these young women who have developed it it's still 25... I turned 24 in July so I've got to wait another 7/8 months until I can have one,