Have I got rectal cancer?

[Toby2000]

You are really scraping the barrel to come up with symptoms which are trivial on their own. I'm not diminishing your sense of suffering but seeing tiny specks of "blood" (which quite frankly could be bits of food) and thinking you're losing weight really are insignificant symptoms. Oh and there was a slight abnormality in blood....which appears to have now pretty much normalised.

Moreover, of course your GP will take age into consideration - because anal cancer in your age group is beyond rare.

Anyway, I'm glad you've been taking med and we can only hope it starts to work soon.

I understand what you’re saying... the doctor said that I sometimes have to look closely to find blood rather than seeing it just on a passing glance where it’s more obvious (which has only happened a few times), and that these things happen to most people and they don’t bat an eye and get on with their lives

I disagree though because when I first bled, it was like blotched all over a side of toilet paper so it’s hard to miss, and then the next “obvious” sighting was in December when it was striped all along the side of the stool

Yep, they start working 4-6 weeks in though apparently

[Toby2000]

Should I go back and beg for a scope?

Because there’s obviously something beyond a fissure or hemherroid that’s bleeding

- July 20th. I see a fairly big blotch of blood on a side of toilet roll

- August. I see a very small trace of blood in some diarrhoea

- October. I see a few very small traces of blood on stool and a large trace in diarrhoea

- November. I see a few very small traces here and there

- December. I see a lot of blood striped along the side of the stool

- January. I see various small traces of blood as well as possible darker blood on the paper

- February. I see some more vague blood in the cracks of stool. And a small trace of red blood on the paper that could’ve been from a fissure but I don’t think so because there was no pain or cut or any when I wiped again. It was like the first bleed but 10x smaller

- March. I just saw that pinprick

Other symptoms: a lot of mucous, weight loss (could be due to anxiety but I doubt it), a sense of incomplete evacuation sometimes, diarrhoea and constipation but only bouts usually depending on what I eat so I don’t know if this should be counted and eosinophilia on the blood test, showing that I had a mild increase of white blood cells and ALP but that went down

How am I the only one concerned about this!?

[Fishmanpa]

'93' pages.....

FMP

[MyNameIsTerry]

You are going to have potentially many points in your life where something happens to your body and you have no real answer for it. When we get sick we don't even obtain a diagnosis because we have an idea of what it is. Monitoring and self care takes care of most minor things from there.

I realise you think that test is going to satisfy you but I disagree because it could come back all clear and the symptoms are still there. How does that tell you what is wrong? But the test may determine there is no cancer red flag hence isn't it really just reassurance seeking?

We've said many times something is wrong and it needs sorting but we aren't saying it's serious which is what you are believing.

When I said you had an all clear what I meant is a doctor told you the abnormal blood readings were sorting themselves out. Then you disappeared from posting for a noticeable time. You even stated you weren't feeling as bad. That all changes when a trigger starts the cycle again. It's a classic doctor reassurance scenario. And the untreated anxiety disorder means a trigger comes and wipes out all that reassurance.

Pursue the doctor for a diagnosis of what is wrong that is causing these symptoms. That's a normal thing to do. Chasing a test you don't understand saying it will make you feel better about it all, classic HA. You can't say that test will stop your anxiety. You only have to look at the HIV/AIDS threads to know that just doesn't work. Some people get over a trigger from tests but my observation of them on here is that these people are outliers. The rest just sink back into the cycle as you have just done. And those people who were outliers just came back when something else happened anyway so it achieved nothing in terms of recovery for them and really only reinforced their disorders through negative behaviours anyway.

I'm pleased you are making a start on your anxiety. Anything new that comes along in those 4-6 weeks can be from the med or as a result of increased anxiety/depression from the med so try to remember this. Are you finding yourself more anxious the longer you are in the med? If so, that's the sad reality of antidepressants and if you can keep going you should find it reduces as you push through the side effect window.

[Toby2000]

Thanks Terry this is just what I needed

I fell back into the trap of googling and got myself a little depressed, especially thinking about all the blood and what it could mean... you’re right not everything has an explanation but surely this does? And if it’s something not serious, what could it be? I feel like the options are so slim now, my particular symptoms are so weird that they must suggest CRC

Yup when I say I’m chasing a sigmoidoscopy, I mean I’m chasing a diagnosis, because as far as I’m aware, a scope is the only real way to find out for sure what’s going on here. Or a CT scan but I doubt they’d give me that.

This worry feels so extreme and desperate... I don’t see how my symptoms could be anything other than cancer. With my other HA worries I would be convinced a cough = lung cancer, but a cough could mean SO MANY things. But I’ve had blood for months now and they couldn’t find hemherroids, my blood test showed that there was no inflammation in my colon so it can’t really be an infection, I also have mucus, I’ve seen traces of blood with softer stools so it can’t be a fissure- what else could it be? So like if I get the all clear for this I will ACCEPT that and I know from a HA sufferer that’s easier said than done but I just need to know it’s not cancer

I haven’t really had any side effects of the anti depressants, I thought a few days ago when I first started taking them that I was feeling really depressed as a result of them but I could’ve just had a worse than usual day.

My main feeling is the feeling of being trapped... the doctors keep turning me away yet I keep seeing blood. What am I supposed to do? Cause as everyone on here knows, it’s HARD being convinced that you’re going to die, it’s a deep sadness that pulls you away from everything you enjoy because you’re, or I’m, too focused on my weight and blood and morbid thoughts. I just want to know I’m going to live :(

[BlueIris]

Toby, you keep saying you've lost weight, but you have no evidence of this, just a feeling.

When you take that into account, can you see how your other concerns might also be exaggerated?

[MyNameIsTerry]

You are chasing an all clear from cancer but that won't give you the answers you need as to what is really causing this. That's just leaving uncertainty in play.

There may be more than one issue through this period. The elevated blood counts have links to parasitic conditions and you had one that went untreated for some time. This may have meant those blood counts were elevated throughout that period and it may also be that they took some time to reduce once you treated the worms. Your GP could answer this if they know the history.

It's a matter of them ruling stuff out until they find the real reason. They've done some of this already and if they are satisfied the blood counts show this is heading in a good direction then they may just be monitoring.

I think you are entitled to an explanation as to what was the problem but often doctors won't speculate if you don't push them to. And they should be saying what their plan of action is.

As for those blood counts and the cancers they can reveal, I doubt a doctor would expect to see them normalising themselves when increased counts are a trigger for cancer specific testing.

[Toby2000]

Her plan of action was for me to eat healthily and drink water (surprise surprise) which is all well and good but I know it’s not my diet causing this, my stools can be soft and I’ll still see traces of blood. Yes I do see blood more often when the stool is harder, that’s when I’ve seen the streak on the sides, but I don’t want to turn into a rabbit just to have softer stools.. I don’t even eat that badly anymore anyway. And I drink lots of water

and if that was blood on the paper when I had pretty loose stools and not food, then that was blood with loose stools and not hard

But yeah. I have to come back in a month to renew my prescription and she said she’d “address the blood” but I don’t think she meant anything serious by it, she was just saying that to make me feel better. She’s obviously not worried and would happily leave it if I wasn’t worried

[Toby2000]

I’m having a harder time than usual now because I’ve noticed that my weight loss is quite evident, I lifted my shirt up just to check and I could see the outline of my ribs slightly which then triggered a huge worry about it this morning. Since then I’ve taken like a million photos of my chest/abdomen and I can definitely see the outline of my ribs, my stomach seems a little flatter and the sides of the middle of my stomach seem sunken in.

I know for certain this is weight loss, there’s no doubt about that, and I feel even more desperate than ever now but I don’t know what to do.. this is absolute torture and I’m feeling MISERABLE

Could it be due to worrying even though I’ve still eaten fatty foods to try and put the weight back on? Or is it not because of worrying since I’ve also been eating a lot?

[MyNameIsTerry]

You need to follow your GP's advice about healthy eating. Don't try to put weight on, you are only sending yourself down another problematic avenue there. People with cancer, who suffer weight loss, se extreme weight loss. I'm sure the people on here who've had or seen chemotherapy will tell you how they have to eat like demons to keep their weight from falling off them.

Visual checks are tricky, and you're not very objective about your symptoms when your anxiety is raised as this thread has shown. Without measuring your weight properly, how do you know? How can you say it isn't a loss of muscle or a loss of fat and how can you say whether it is a red flag anyway as it could just be a few pounds? It could be water being shed.

It just sounds to me like you've lost a few pounds. Most people would be glad of it but it's your fear of cancer and making the associations without properly understanding what else it could be.

Taking photos, and excessively, is just compulsion feeing obsession. It's more checking, more comparing. Rushing straight into the worry of cancer without considering the other possibilities.

Didn't you say you had been eating better for a while? That may be why you have lost weight and I'm sure we can all tell you that losing/gaining weight is something you don't notice everyday, you suddenly see a difference.