Lymphoma fears

[Afox32]

Well where do I start, I’ve really spiralled in the last two or so months with my HA but am experiencing multiple symptoms. At the start of the year I had a slight pain in my upper abdomen and my lower left which in turn made my testicle ache.. so inevitably I thought it was testicular cancer, had an ultrasound and everything was fine. My HA didn’t let up though and I spent weeks worrying about it being my bowels instead. I saw the gp who said he didn’t believe that to be the case as I didn’t have red flag symptoms. At this point I wasn’t eating properly and must of been miserable to be around. I had my full bloods taken and everything was fine except low lymphocytes however the dr notes said it was not significant and no further action required. Which leaves me where I am today still absolutely petrified and down the lymphoma rabbit hole now. My sons just turned one and all I can think about is whether or not I will make it to see him grow up. It’s a horrible spiral which has seen me in tears in my gp surgery twice since then. I’ve been referred for an abdominal ultrasound which is in 5 weeks time. It’s just going to be torture waiting for that. I just needed to get it off my chest and reading through this forum everyone seems really kind. So I was looking for a bit of advice and assurance really if anyone’s been through any thing similar.

[Griffo]

You’ve gone from testicular cancer, to bowel cancer, to lymphoma. I would imagine you’d be feeling pretty damn ill if you had all of these.

I try to tell myself this too, as over the past 4 weeks I’ve gone from lymphoma, to leukaemia, to stomach cancer, bowel cancer, bone cancer, skin cancer and now back to lymphoma 🙄

I’ve started therapy recently and we talk a lot about living for “what is” and not “what if”. Don’t live in your head - it’s all fantasy!

[Afox32]

Thanks Griffo! Very true my gp has suggested cbt ect which I’m more than likely going to take up once I get my ultrasound results back. Feels like a constant battle in my head. In all honesty I think a lot of my health anxiety stems back to losing my sister at a young age and never really dealing with the trauma which I think has now manifested in having extreme health anxiety. Do you have any symptoms that make you think about these illnesses too?

[Griffo]

Thanks Griffo! Very true my gp has suggested cbt ect which I’m more than likely going to take up once I get my ultrasound results back. Feels like a constant battle in my head. In all honesty I think a lot of my health anxiety stems back to losing my sister at a young age and never really dealing with the trauma which I think has now manifested in having extreme health anxiety. Do you have any symptoms that make you think about these illnesses too?

I do! I have swollen lymph nodes that i've had for at least 5 years. I recently have had a fungal rash which started my latest HA episode, and for some reason i decided to Google "itchy armpits" and came across an article (i think it was on healthline) that said you can get itchy armpits and rashes with Lymphoma and Leukemia. I even looked at the pictures of rashes from those cancers and mine looked nothing like them, but i still haven't been able to get it out of my head. Then i started to search for cancer + fungal rashes and saw the odd article about you can be more prone to them if you have cancer as your immune system is compromised.

I then realised i was just looking to connect my symptoms with something, rather than the other way round. To test this i started searching for things like "lymphoma toe" and as i suspected, things came up. So you can literally put anything in and you'll find something to worry about.

I saw two GPs in one week. the first one gave me some cream for the rash, which has cleared it up. The second one basically prescribed me more exercise (when i'm having HA episodes i stop looking after myself properly) and the need to create more of a routine (make sure i get up earlier at the same time, have breakfast, etc etc). I still keep thinking "what if x and x" and why didn't they send me for blood tests etc? I guess its because they've probably seen lots of people with lymphoma and leukemia over their decades of being GPs and I had none of what they would see as symptoms. Doctors are often looking for certain things, and what we read about them online are rarely the same things I find!