TLDR: I have chronic bloating, heaviness/pressure, occasional pain, and a lump/ridge, localized in my lower right abdomen, and would be pleased to hear if anyone has experienced the same cluster of symptoms.

Hi everyone - I have lurked on this forum for a long time, and I'm very grateful that this community exists. I'm male and in my early thirties and have suffered from health anxiety for many years, and this forum really helps to defuse my worries when my brain goes into overdrive over a symptom. Now I'm having persistent issues, and would appreciate some outside perspective/input from people who have experienced the same.

For almost 2 months I've had bloating, distension, and a general heavy feeling in my lower right abdomen, below and to the right of my belly button/to the left of my right hip bone. It honestly feels like a tennis ball is lodged somewhere in there, and I can feel pressure and discomfort in the area against my belt, when lying on my right side, and even when just sitting around in loose-fitting clothes. The bloating is already there in the morning and gets progressively worse throughout the day, and sometimes keeps me up at night as a I toss and turn trying to find a comfortable sleeping position.

On top of this, I have occasional pain in the area (brief pangs/aches a few times a day in my right side, groin, or around navel), loud and high-pitched grumbling and gurgling in the same region, and I alternate between brief constipation (passing nothing or little for a few hours despite urge to go) and loose almost-diarrhea 2-3x per day.

Most worrying of all is that I can feel a ridge or small sausage-shaped lump about halfway between and a little below my navel and hip bone, even first thing in the morning before the bloating has got too bad. It's somewhat deep (you have to push moderately to feel it, though not with maximum force), quite thin, has no defined upper edge, and is moderately firm (not rock hard but not soft/squishy either) and slightly moveable. I think this is my cecum (the first part of the colon/large bowel, where it joins the small intestine), but I have no way of knowing if 1) it is normal to be able to feel your cecum (websites mostly suggest it isn't except in emaciated people, which I'm not) and 2) if a cecum should feel like this, or if mine is somehow enlarged and hardened by an underlying problem.

Now, I've had abdominal symptoms many times before (acid reflux, upper abdominal pain, generalized bloating) so I've learned to try to ignore them and avoid going down an HA rabbit-hole. But rarely do symptoms last this long, and the localization in my lower right abdomen is new.

Of course, my HA brain is screaming at me that I have a tumour in my caecum, small intestine, or ascending colon that must be partially obstructing the passageway, causing the localized bloating, pain, and gurgling. I will go and see my doctor if it persists (it's already been almost 2 months), but I can't do that until early August, because right now I'm working abroad, and I only have emergency health coverage (and this doesn't seem to warrant going to the ER/A&E).

On the plus side, I don't have blood in my stools, and my weight has been mostly steady (from 80kg six weeks ago to 77kg today - a minor fluctuation). So I'm trying to be rational, telling myself that a worst-case-scenario of right-sided colon cancer or some other malignancy is unlikely, and this could all be another manifestation of anxiety or undiagnosed IBS. Hence why it would be reassuring to hear if others have experienced this and found this to be a benign issue.