AnxiousAbbie
21-01-18, 04:21
Hi everyone. This is going to be a long one!
A year ago I was suffering through the worst period of HA in my life. I managed to convince myself that I had breast cancer, lymphoma, ovarian cancer, ALS and brain cancer over the period of about 5 months. After my doctor put me on Zoloft, I've had a really good year. First year of full time work after uni, and overall it was great.
Towards the end of last year I felt my HA creeping up a bit. I was having some odd symptoms and the thought of leukaemia started popping into my head, so I went to the drs for a checkup and blood tests. She checked FBC, thyroid, iron levels, liver function, vitamin d - all fine.
In early December I was feeling quite stressed at work. My best friend left the company and I was going overseas just before Christmas (I've had a historic phobia of flying and while the Zoloft helps, it still weighs on my mind). I noticed around this time I had diarrhoea one day, and I noticed some mucus another day.
We went to Indonesia just before Christmas where I picked up some diarrhoea bug on our second day (which I took Imodium for and was fine), and then vomiting on our third last night. Since getting back, I've been noticing I have looser bowel movements every morning (often urgent) at almost exactly the same time. I'm usually fine for the rest of the day, or then alternate to constipation later on. I have been getting a bit of cramping beforehand and gas as well.
Went to the docs about this and she did more blood tests (FBC, liver function, kidney function, coeliac, some inflammation marker which she said would be up if I had an infection, iron/ferritin levels) and two stool samples. All blood tests came back perfect again, and stool samples only found a type of parasite which is apparently really common and the medical community doesn't even think it causes anything (blastocystis).
Of course my mind has jumped to bowel cancer even though it's very rare in my age group (im 24). I just can't put the symptoms down to anxiety because the Zoloft kind of dulls the anxiety if that makes sense. My questions are, do all stool tests check for occult blood? And, does this sound more like IBS to you? Trying to keep my anxious thoughts/behaviours under control, even though I'm scared to go to the toilet at the moment.
Thank you and appreciate this board so much! It has been a great help on some dark days :hugs:
A year ago I was suffering through the worst period of HA in my life. I managed to convince myself that I had breast cancer, lymphoma, ovarian cancer, ALS and brain cancer over the period of about 5 months. After my doctor put me on Zoloft, I've had a really good year. First year of full time work after uni, and overall it was great.
Towards the end of last year I felt my HA creeping up a bit. I was having some odd symptoms and the thought of leukaemia started popping into my head, so I went to the drs for a checkup and blood tests. She checked FBC, thyroid, iron levels, liver function, vitamin d - all fine.
In early December I was feeling quite stressed at work. My best friend left the company and I was going overseas just before Christmas (I've had a historic phobia of flying and while the Zoloft helps, it still weighs on my mind). I noticed around this time I had diarrhoea one day, and I noticed some mucus another day.
We went to Indonesia just before Christmas where I picked up some diarrhoea bug on our second day (which I took Imodium for and was fine), and then vomiting on our third last night. Since getting back, I've been noticing I have looser bowel movements every morning (often urgent) at almost exactly the same time. I'm usually fine for the rest of the day, or then alternate to constipation later on. I have been getting a bit of cramping beforehand and gas as well.
Went to the docs about this and she did more blood tests (FBC, liver function, kidney function, coeliac, some inflammation marker which she said would be up if I had an infection, iron/ferritin levels) and two stool samples. All blood tests came back perfect again, and stool samples only found a type of parasite which is apparently really common and the medical community doesn't even think it causes anything (blastocystis).
Of course my mind has jumped to bowel cancer even though it's very rare in my age group (im 24). I just can't put the symptoms down to anxiety because the Zoloft kind of dulls the anxiety if that makes sense. My questions are, do all stool tests check for occult blood? And, does this sound more like IBS to you? Trying to keep my anxious thoughts/behaviours under control, even though I'm scared to go to the toilet at the moment.
Thank you and appreciate this board so much! It has been a great help on some dark days :hugs: