February 21st is the first time throughout all of this (and I really hope only time, touch wood) that I noticed blood in my stools. This is obviously a sign of bowel cancer and to be expected, but honestly it freaked me out. It did not look like a lot, but while honesty is the main policy of this document, I cried upstairs on my own for a bit as I was scared for my health. I eventually went downstairs and was in tears with my wife. I then called 111 who once a doctor had called me back, advised me to go to A&E. I really didn’t want to go back to hospital, as I couldn’t stand the thought of being in hospital overnight again, but eventually I went after a lot of persuading from my wife just to get checked out and make sure I was ok.
In Frimley, I had the usual observations taken, a plus side was my haemoglobin at this stage was 96, so a significant improvement from where I had been a month or so ago. Another poor doctor then had to put a finger up my bottom to check for bleeding, at the time nothing was mentioned to me about being unusual, but I have now got a copy of the discharge note which says there were signs of fresh blood. However they discussed this with the surgical team who agreed there was no emergency treatment required and that I should wait for the outcome of the MDT meeting (which was moving onto an oncologist). In total this trip lasted just over 3 hours.
My reason for putting this section in, it is ok to be scared at any stage of this going on, it is ok to cry as well, but I should have just gone to hospital when 111 said, it is just extra stress to have put my wife through when I really didn’t want to go, which she didn’t really need. Equally I could have been home before 10 that evening had I just gone straight away (when I got home I was starving as I hadn’t had any dinner before I went in).
