Why me.

Hi Chris,

Welcome to this part of the forum although I am really sorry for the reasons you have posted. I am thinking that most cancer patients diagnosed at a young age will have asked that question. It might take you a long time to answer it, and like me, you may find that there is no answer. 

I get the feelings of being scared. I also have a wife and young children. To a large extent, the loss of feeling of control was one of the harder things to deal with about the whole thing. But it’s good you have a plan, good you have something to work towards, good that you caught it early. They might all sound like false positives, but I think they are all genuine positives. 

One day at a time, and don’t think too much would be my advice for now.

Hope this helps.

All the best

Greg

Hi Chris you described my feelings to a tee back in July. The way I see it you can look at it two ways 

1. I’m 40, the average age of Bowel cancer diagnosis is 75 and I’m fit, never smoked and have no family history of it so why me?

2. I’m young, fit and it’s been caught early. Like you they are aiming for cure. It could have been worse, much worse so I should go be grateful they caught it early. 

I just try to focus on (2). Thoughts about (1) come into my mind occasionally but they are no help to me so I try to block them out. 

I have 3 children under 10 and that is my biggest struggle - I can’t imagine leaving them when they are so young - so need to kick this for them.

ps I asked my Oncologist this. She said it’s likely genetics if that helps. 

Hope that helps a little,

Rich