LEFT IN THE DARK

Hi Moralsupport1 and a warm welcome to the board. Yes it’s a shock isn’t it? I also saw the mass in my rectum on screen and they told me afterwards that they were 99% sure that it was cancerous and the biopsies that they’d taken would be sent off to the lab to confirm. I had been passing blood and having loose stools but naively thought it might be piles.

I then had a CT scan and then the nurse rang to arrange an MRI and told me that the path lab results had confirmed that it was cancer. Once all the scan results were back and the MDT had decided on a treatment plan, I met with the consultant and things honestly felt a bit better once I knew the plan.

Bowel cancer is notoriously slow growing but very treatable so please try not to assume the worst. 
I’ve attached a link to a recent MacMillan article about dealing with stress and the support desk is also open every day if you want to chat to someone?

 Do you need help managing stress 

The next months will be tough but we’re all at different stages of treatment and recovery on here and happy to help and support you through yours

Take care

Karen x

Thank you for your reply. The idea there might be some hope is something so worth having. Do you mind my asking what the treartment plan was in your case? Do they start telling you the whole picture and not breadcrumbs at some stage? Waiting is hard. Imagining its spread all over. Cos no answers. Dr google makes it worse. 

 Moralsupport1 

Doctor google is not your friend so please avoid! Yes when I met the surgeon he told me that there was no spread but they suspected a couple of lymph nodes affected. Because I had a rectal tumour they aim to shrink it before surgery so I was told I’d have chemoradiotherapy then a break before surgery then follow up chemo if necessary - if you click on my name then my profile page will show my timeline.

Even if there is spread to other organs then there is still a lot of treatment available - bowel cancer is one of the most treatable cancers.

Try and stay away from google - it can be out of date and you’ll end up scaring yourself silly. Wait until you have all the facts in place then focus on 1 step at a time. 

There are a lot of people who’ve passed through this board and are now getting on with their lives - it will be my 10 year anniversary this year - so please don’t feel that there’s no hope. It will be tough at times but the treatment is doable so get yourself in the best place possible and we’ll get you through this x

Thank you Karen its so kind of you to tell me and does give me some real hope for first time in days. Driven myself mad. Looked so frightening on the screen. Absolute shock. I expected a polyp and thought I was catastrophising to worry! So when the camera zoomed in it was genuinely alarming.  X thank you so much for being kind. Is reassuring.

Interesting read.  When I had mine done I was put under anaesthetic, not knowing what was going on until afterwards when the consultant came in to update me.  Not sure which is worse seeing it or not.

You were put under general anaesthtic? What kind of scan? Do you mean sedation/colonscopy? What did you know beforehand? 

It was alarming to see normal tube then this obviously mutant area all of a sudden but in all honesty see it/hear it. Negligble difference still same news. Did the consultant tell you what it meant or detail? The lack of information except for the obvious?  I find the lack of knowing severity and what it means hardest to cope with. Specially emotional horror. Have to hold in until know more at least as is summer holiddays and live alone with my child. Superhuman strength not to cry. Distracted in thought a lot.

Sedation/colonoscopy.  FIT test result abnormal.  Colonoscopy recommended.  As I say they gave me an anathaestic and knew nothing about the procedure until the consultant came in with his feedback. The only one I actually saw was the one where they checked if the operation to remove the tumour had healed.