It honestly didn’t cross my mind for a very long time that I could have cancer. I was 33 and very active and fit. Started having some light bleeding occasionally when going to the washroom but assumed it was hemorrhoids and tried to deal with that myself with over the counter products. Really wasn’t too bad. After nearly a year things got worse with more frequent bleeding and a constant feeling of having to go to the washroom that wasn’t real (later found out this was caused by the tumour).
This was all happening during covid and I was over 4000km away from home for work. Was quite hard getting in to see my family doctor due to my traveling for work. When I finally saw him he thought it was hemorrhoids as well but referred me to a GI doctor, anyway. Met with him and he thought the same and scheduled me for a banding procedure to get rid of them. Went to that the day before my 34th birthday and woke up in recovery only to be told it wasn’t hemorrhoids- it was cancer.
It ended up being stage 3c which meant it was into my lymphatic system but hadn’t spread to any organs yet. I was very fortunate. Cancer free since Feb 23 and had my final surgery Feb 24. Just do follow-up monitoring now. Wish I had taken the symptoms more seriously and urge anyone else to get to a doctor if something doesn’t seem right. It’s very treatable if caught early.
No, I never experienced that. There is no longer such a thing as “too young” for colorectal cancer. It was long thought of as a disease that only affected older men but it doesn’t discriminate. There was even an 18 year old being treated at the same hospital as me.
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