View Full Version : Extremely scared I have bowel cancer
Hi everyone :welcome:
I'm new to this forum, but I'm very glad I found it. I've read many reassuring posts here and I feel slightly better now. I woke up about an hour ago, absolutely convinced I have bowel cancer. I have pain on my right side for over a year now, there's a lot of fresh blood coming out of me when I'm constipated and I have frequent diarrhea and gases. It doesn't help that my mother was diagnosed with it a year ago or so. I've started googling my symptoms (I know...) and it seems I've been missing bowel cancer for so long now that I'm afraid it might have already spread. I'm sick with worries, I'm making a doctor appointment today, but it will take weeks to confirm it (or disprove it) and I don't know how to handle it.
At the same time I know I have health anxiety, I'm 25 and I've been already pretty much convinced I have a heart disease, brain tumor, pancreatic cancer and very recently also liver cancer or cirrhosis. I've spent the last month crying myself to sleep after reading various stories about young females dying of liver disease, and all symptoms fit me. Of course now I'm worried I was focusing on my liver while it was bowel cancer all along. I'm mad at myself, I've wasted so much time diagnosing my liver that I've completely ignored bleeding from my rectum for months now.
Anyways, I will go see a doctor of course, but I could use some reassurance, as I'm extremely scared right now. I've stumpled upon some story about woman in her 20s dying of bowel cancer and here I am, having another panic attack over my impending death. I know it's silly (it is, right?), but as always, this time it really feels real. I can't go back to sleep, because every time I lay down I start trembling and picturing the moment doctor tells me I have only weeks to live. I hate my anxiety.
i have just been through ultrasound for right sided pain i have ibs constip and sometimes blood on wiping BUT i am 54 years old and they said ultrasound shows nothing to worry about i was convinced cancer would show straight away but it didnt health anxiety messes with your head a great deal i know read some of my posts every thing has to be that before its ought else its spoilt a lot of my life for 15 years dont let it do that to you and bowel cancer at your age is very very rare indeed try to fill your time up God bless
Hi
I know exactly how you feel
I'm 32 and by reading all the statistics it's something like I've got a 0.02% in getting bowel cancer
I have however convinced myself I have it, the more you read online the more you find these 20 and 30 year olds with cancer so your anxiety goes through the roof thinking it's way more common than the statistics make out.
I'm convinced I'm stage 4 and it's spread to my liver but I'm not a "priority" to get referred because I've never noticed any blood. Even though I have alsorts of other issues going on that would make sense (they could also all be anxiety or ibs) which means I don't have an appointment now till the end of May. :scared15:
I'm petrified, my upper bloating / aches are putting me off eating so now I'm losing weight. I'm itching the last few days, so I'm convinced my liver is now falling. My lower discomfort that I've had none stop for 10 weeks still lingers in the background and is where I think my tumour is, realistically down there it would probably be causing some sort of obstruction or at least a lot of pain as stool passes.. But it doesnt really.
Things don't add up, there's plenty of things both you and i could have that isn't cancer. Most people with blood seem to have hemorrhoids, in fact I've.got at least one I know about and if I ever see blood in my stool even though its probably that.. I'd still go absolutely mad.
I am also scared to get some answers even though it's not going away on its own. But I've had thoughts / nightmares of being told its spread everywhere and I've got weeks to live.
It's very difficult to know what symptoms are real and what are just worry, throw in IBS and you really don't know where you are..
i have just been through ultrasound for right sided pain i have ibs constip and sometimes blood on wiping BUT i am 54 years old and they said ultrasound shows nothing to worry about i was convinced cancer would show straight away but it didnt health anxiety messes with your head a great deal i know read some of my posts every thing has to be that before its ought else its spoilt a lot of my life for 15 years dont let it do that to you and bowel cancer at your age is very very rare indeed try to fill your time up God bless
Thank you for your answer. I'm very jelaous of people who are able to shrug their symptoms off or treat them like something normal that's need to be checked, and not the death sentence. It's ruining my life, I can't sleep, I'm constantly worried, there's no point in doing anything since I'll probably die soon. I hope it's anxiety again and I will manage it finally.
I'm convinced I'm stage 4 and it's spread to my liver but I'm not a "priority" to get referred because I've never noticed any blood. Even though I have alsorts of other issues going on that would make sense (they could also all be anxiety or ibs) which means I don't have an appointment now till the end of May.
That must be terrible, I'm sorry for you, I can't imaging waiting months for diagnosis. The system sucks. I'm fortunate enough to have access to private health care, so all of my appointments are within couple of days, but even then waiting for results is nightmare for me, it must be scary to have to wait for so long and having doctors ignore your worries.
I was sick with worries about my liver just 2 weeks ago, so I've contacted a lot of doctors about it and run many tests and they basically told me that I would definitely know if my liver was not ok. If it was so damaged as I think it was I'd turn yellow and would get admitted to ER right away.
There are some home tests you can buy to check your overall health, if you want an ease of mind you can try them, maybe they'll work for you. For me they convinced me further there's something really wrong with my liver, since bilirubin colour was off and I've started reading about it and here it comes, it's definitely liver damage. So you have to be careful with them.
Liver damage can also be detected with blood works, maybe you can convince your doctor to run them for you or get them yourself, I don't think they're very expensive. Either way, I'm convinced your liver is fine, but I understand very well the need for answers, so I'd probably try to get them before May in order not to go insane with worries.
As for blood in stools, I was so convinced it's hemorrhoids that I've never bothered checking it (too occupied with my liver functions to even think about it :doh: ). Epecially that they come and go, and the blood is only there when I have bad constipation. Now that I know my liver is fine it seems like obvious sign that I have terminal bowel cancer for months, but I'm trying to stay calm and look for other causes.
It's both funny and sad how you can read about IBS and hemorrhoids and see that not only all the symptoms fit, but they literally happen to 25-50% of people, but we must obsess over this insignificant 0,02%.
I could go private.. And the longer this goes on the more I think i should. I have had some sort of general blood and urine test which was back in February and was flagged as "alright"
I'm not under any assumptions that the blood test would catch everything but I'd like to think it would have been a general glance at all my levels to see if anything else needed more testing (although back then I never had this upper ache)
I mean it would cost thousands to go private but im so damn afraid, I keep telling myself it might get better on its own... But it very obviously isn't. I don't know how I'd feel about only waiting a few days for appointments.. Its great you don't have to wait but I get in such a state I don't know how I'd mentally cope!
I personally can't bring myself to do any home kits. It would be a negative and I wouldn't believe it.. Or maybe it would be a positive or id have potentially done it wrong and made the test invalid but put myself in a state over the results (I tried a home celiac test and.. That was a lot messier with blood than the instructions mentioned!)
I did see the other liver symptom was turning yellow.. I do find myself checking in the bathroom mirror everytime I go in there to check my eyes!..it does seem. If our livers was on their way out it would be a lot more noticeable than the odd ache or itch
I've had blood once, many a year back after a bout of constipation and a tear so I've seen it before. I knew I'd done some damage down there as I had a new pain I'd never experienced and I could barely sit down for a while afterwards!
I suppose if you think you have terminal cancer that means it's gone somewhere else? Wouldn't that imply another organ would be hurting / not. Working properly. I'd like to think (and from what I've spent many a week reading) if we had cancer it would either be dark tarry stools if the tumour was on the right.. Or a. Brighter red if it was on the left, but with it being on the left you would expect some sort of pain that would be getting worse as it was starting to cause an obstruction? I think!
It's a horrible situation to be in, I'd like to feel the more tests we have that come back negative the better outcome it properly is, unfortunately I've only had bloods!
Symptoms of advanced (stage 4) cancer of any kind would be a lot more than bleeding or bloating. Fresh blood, and a significant amount of it from the rectum for someone of your age is 99.9% likely to be down to hemorrhoids, internal OR external, meaning sometimes you won't even be able to detect them yourself.
Trust me, I know that all logic and rationale goes out the window as soon as a symptom pops up with Healthy Anxiety. I completely 100% emphathise with you on this, as I'm in the exact same place you are on an almost daily basis now.
If you had stage 4 Cancer that had spread to your liver, you wouldn't just be jaundice (yellow skin) but you'd have a stomach like you're 9 months pregnant, constantly. Not from bloating, but from retained fluid, it wouldn't go away and come back either, it'd be constantly there until it was drained, manually.
The reason why we hear about these poor young people with these horrid illnesses is because they're SO rare. They're so rare that they make the news. The odds are absolutely in your favour my love.
I know it's hard, even unbearable at times, but do try and absorb these words and just quiet your mind and put a sitcom on or something. Watch F.R.I.E.N.D.S, it helps my anxiety sometimes.
Thank you all for replies, I've tried calming down and visitied gastroenterologist yesterday to run additional tests and I'm panicking again :weep:
He didn't take me seriously at all, just told me it's probably IBS + hemorrhoids and I should take the meds he prescribed me and see him in 4 weeks if my symptoms won't go away.
In the meantime, I've practically convinced myself I have colon cancer. All my symptoms are as listed:
- blood while defacating (especially while constipated, but when I'm not I sometimes feel my anus hurt and see the blood on the paper then)
- diarrhea, constipation
- pain on the right side of abdomen for over a year now, it comes and goes, now it's mostly in my upper back
- extreme fatigue
- I've had black stool once, but it was after drinking red wine so I thought then that's the cause
I know I should just wait for the colonoscopy in 4 weeks, but I can't function properly right now. I've made mistake and visited a forum for colon cancer survivors and not only they all have symptoms similar to mine, but lot of them were very young, like me.
I'm also scared the cancer is already in my bones/spine, as my back often hurts and I can feel some kind of "dent" in my spine. I'm so so scared, it's terrible, all I can think of is how much I'm afraid to die this young :weep:
I always try and find things with my own condition that don't really add up just to give me some hope!
One thing I can think of
If it was a tumour in your lower right I don't think that would make any difference to your stool consistency?
the stool is all liquid in the lower right so it would just pass through regardless and then carry on bulking up as it travels through?
At least thats how I've taken it from my months of research! (although I've been on the same forums as you I'm also sure of it)
It is a good way to calm yourself down, but for me it works the other way.
I start reading about IBS and see it's associated with the pain on the left side (mine is right...), urge to defacate after meals (I don't have one), it goes away after certain meals (again, not me...). And that's where I start panicking :(
It's just hard for me to understand how it can be IBS if my symptoms are so different.
unsure_about_this
11-04-18, 07:40
I done the crime of reading about bowel cancer 4 or 5 years ago when I thought I had it, because of my symptoms, abdominal pains etc. it turned out from the camera test and nuclear ct/mri scsn? cannot remember which, was a small common pouch which is not serious.
I worry about my health a lot.
Hey. I recently had the same anxiety as you. It started in early December when I passed a lot of blood in my stool. Waiting until late January to get colonoscopy was devastating - my anxiety affected my relationships and school. Here's some reassurance - fresh blood is almost always due to hemorrhoids, they may bleed on and off, and if they are internal you won't even feel any pain when having a bowel movement. Also there's many reasons for constipation, like diet and other benign diseases. Also, age. Colon cancer develops from polyps, which grow about 10 years. That's why colon cancer is attributed to older people, and it's statistically verified. I know how you feel, during my anxiety I literally checked my every bowel movement for blood, I had weird symptoms like passing only mucus etc but eventually it turned out to be a small benign polyp which got removed during the colonoscopy. If you wanna talk about it then pm me, as I went through it, my uncle is a surgeon and explained a lot of things about bowel cancer to me, and also you're Polish as well :D
Here's a link(just remove spaces) to my thread on another forum-you can see that I was scared sh*tless too(pun intended) http://coloncancersupport.colonclub.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=59201
First of all, thank you all for replies! It's much easier knowing that other people have experienced something similar and they got over it.
Mostu, are you sure the link you've provided is correct? I've copied it without the spaces but it still doesn't work.
I'm glad your symptoms turned out ok, and that you had someone to talk to about your worries (I'd kill for such an uncle :D I don't have anyone close to me that could ease my worries). I know I just have to wait for colonoscopy and try not to panic, but you see, I read about other symptoms, like yours, and they just don't fit mine. IBS is supposed to be accompanied by passing mucus or rushing to toilet after meals, and I just don't have that. Just lots of gases, this weird pain on my right side, sometimes blood and constant diarrhea/constipation. I know I'm overthinking this, but I'm so anxious I can't longer sleep because of this.
And greetings from Poland :) Did you went to see the doctor privately? A month of waiting for colonoscopy sounds terrible, but still not so bad if it was done with NFZ.
Capercrohnj
11-04-18, 18:29
IBS can effect your entire colon so pain can be on either side. IBS also can be both constipation and diarrhea.
Sorry, fixed the link now
http://coloncancersupport.colonclub.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=59201
Also my uncle basically managed to get me a colonoscopy in his hospital in Kraków, there's a trick to get colonoscopy easier in Poland, I'll pm you ;)
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