Stuck down the colorectal cancer rabbit hole (no pun intended)

[Drako]

Hey everyone, brand new to this forum! Hope you're all well.

I'm a 33 year old male and consider myself a veteran of the health anxiety cadre. I have also suffered with IBS, or at least I was told this by a doctor (without tests) when I was in my early 20's. I'm mostly in that IBS-D camp from stress or spicy / oily foods. Usual bowel habits for me are around twice a day and a good consistency between solid or softer smaller pieces.

Around November 2021, I was going through a period of bad job stress and at the same time, decided to take to a healthier diet of lots of vegetables. What I noticed was an extreme amount of gas build up that would make my lower left stomach feel like pressure and pain, this would usually lead to a fairly explosive bowel movement shortly after. There was also one night where my wife and I accidentally cooked and ate fish from frozen that should have been defrosted. We both had awful watery bowel movements about an hour later. At the time I remember thinking to myself that this was a noticeable change in my usual habits.

And what did I do? I took to google for colon cancer. Discovered the increase of incidents of younger people, read younger people's stories, symptoms etc. Became more of an obsession. Around mid December leading up to Christmas I cut out some of the veg and relaxed about work, and dismissed the colon cancer thing - bowel movements mostly went back to normal!

Come January 1st after a NYE of tons of flavoured vodka, wine and pizza, my stomach is all over the place. Decided to google IBS and stuff...and colon cancer...and now ever since this I've lived everyday with this worry. My bowel movements then became looser, with faint stomach aches. Then blood gate started; I began to over analyse trying to spot bright red. Of course I would spot tomato and pepper skins etc, sometimes I wouldn't be sure if it was blood, sometimes it obviously wasn't. Got to the point where I'd be trying to spot the tiniest pin head sized specks of red, but if I ever found any they were solid.

Now in the last 2 months I've mostly had usual bowel movements, but about every 2/3 weeks I will get a sudden grumbly stomach (like an actual washing machine), not much pain, but a sudden need to run to the bathroom with explosive action. On trying to recognise a pattern it tends to be about 1 hour after I eat or drink lots of water, and I never need to go more than once - I've not had a day where I need to keep revisiting the bathroom. Until Thursday just been I reached nearly 3 and a bit weeks without any issues, when suddenly on the train (after an overly exciting / stressed day) I could feel that horrible pressure again and need to go, got home it was explosive - yet in the morning it was completely normal! I have to also mention that because of my anxiety I have stopped looking inside the bowl out of fear of seeing blood.

Following Thursday I decided to call the doctor. He told me he first wants to do a stool sample test to look for infections and other bits. If negative he then wants to do a blood stool sample test, if positive I guess he'd want to do a colonoscopy or something. If negative then god knows, maybe he'll put it down to stress. But today I am due to pick up the tube and do the first test, which will be the first time I've properly looked at the stool in a month or so - I am fairly scared and have a lot of anxiety right now. I guess I just wanted to share this, and I'm sorry for the length of my post.

[Catkins]

It does sound IBS related. My insides can go for weeks being fine then all of a sudden flare up again.

[JitteryBirb]

Avian here, your stomach is home to multiple types of microorganisms that feed on different types of food. I see you switching foods a lot which can kill many organisms and switch bowel types. I wouldn't worried and if you are use those test kits that look for altered DNA they are pretty cheap. Any way God Bless and goodbye.

[Ian3124]

In somewhat of a similar boat. You can read my recent post to see what I mean. For me it’s very similar when it comes to the blood analysis. I’m pretty sure it’s tomato in my case but same as you - I’m analysing everything. I think perhaps tomato tends to smear or streak stool in a way somewhat similar to blood - so being over analytical on this and has me in a similar worry every day now. It’s taking up far too much energy

[Drako]

Thank you for replying! I'm sorry to hear about your issues too. When they do flare up, can it be fine one minute and then all of a sudden that watery sensation where you suddenly find yourself needing to head to the toilet etc? I'm finding that mine can be a typical stomach grumbling and churning, and I'll almost feel it building up near the exit quite quickly before that sensation appears. Now days because I'm constantly anxious and thinking about these things it's like I'm extra sensitive to my bowel, like almost nervous to do anything or go anywhere incase it kicks off, and in turn it begins to stir....

[Drako]

Can't believe I didn't see this sorry for late reply! That's really interesting cause that's exactly what I'm doing! Like today I found after wiping the tiniest spec of something that had a red tinge to it and a very faint pinkish patch on the toilet paper around it, but really tiny. Sometimes I'm convinced it's food, sometimes I can't be sure!

[NoraB]

Here's what I am seeing here..


I'm mostly in that IBS-D camp

Then...


Around November 2021, I was going through a period of bad job stress and at the same time, decided to take to a healthier diet of lots of vegetables

Ooh 'ello, stress AND a drastic diet change? :ohmy:


What I noticed was an extreme amount of gas build up that would make my lower left stomach feel like pressure and pain, this would usually lead to a fairly explosive bowel movement shortly after.

I only have to glance sideways at a pea and I'm puffing up like I'm six months pregnant (and the loo doesn't know what's hit it!) :scared15:


At the time I remember thinking to myself that this was a noticeable change in my usual habits.

And, like so many of us, you didn't make the connection that this was most likely down to the diet change..

So what did you do?


I took to google for colon cancer

Hello health anxiety! :emot-wave:


Come January 1st after a NYE of tons of flavoured vodka, wine and pizza, my stomach is all over the place. Decided to google IBS and stuff...and colon cancer...and now ever since this I've lived everyday with this worry.

And now you've moved onto the 'poking through me poo' stage where everything in the pan that doesn't resemble a perfect 4 on the Bristol crap chart fills your heart with abstract fear & dread, right?

Been there. Done that. Worn out the T shirt.. :yesyes:

I'm currently in an IBS flare of epic proportions (mostly because I too have been arsing around with my diet) and yours sounds exactly like IBS with a hefty dose of health anxiety which will definitely help to keep those explosive shits coming!

Investigating your own crap isn't to be advised as this is posh nosh dining for the HA gremlin. Blood is fairly obvious, you don't need to go poking about for it. You would see it in the pan and on the bog roll and the most likely causes would be piles or fissure. When my husband's piles are giving him gyp I don't know whether to clean the loo or cordon it off with crime scene tape! (no exaggeration) :emot-puke:

Anxiety directly affects the digestive system. You have been diagnosed with IBS and in your 20s (me too). I have learned (the hard way) that it's not a good idea to make sudden dietary changes or that piling my plate with veg is necessarily good for me. My colon doesn't seem to think so anyway. If you are going to try anything, try going Low FODMAP but the reality is that IBS affects people differently so it's a case of working out your triggers.

Stress? That will do it too. So work on lowering your stress levels as much as you can. Go walk in the woods admiring the bluebells, Stroke a cat. Do something that gets you away from the bathroom and from your fearful imaginings.

Do yourself a MASSIVE favour. Stop Googling symptoms and STOP ROOTIN' ABOUT IN YA POO! :redcard:

Crap. Wipe. Courtesy glance as you toss the loo roll in. Flush. (flush again if you're anything like me) Wash hands. Go.

[Ian3124]

Can't believe I didn't see this sorry for late reply! That's really interesting cause that's exactly what I'm doing! Like today I found after wiping the tiniest spec of something that had a red tinge to it and a very faint pinkish patch on the toilet paper around it, but really tiny. Sometimes I'm convinced it's food, sometimes I can't be sure!

I think NoraBs response below is quite the perfect response for both of us to be honest (I’d recently posted about similar on another thread), I think deep down I know I’m being very compulsive. I think my gut tells me myself I saw tomato two times over the last 2 months and I’ve worked myself into a tizzy. I do silly things - I’m still checking - I’m almost giving myself until x amount of weeks of seeing nothing until I ‘allow’ myself to forget about it. Since October before this I was at one point convinced I had alopecia, immediately followed by being convinced I had ALS and now this. It’s been the worst health anxiety spikes I’ve had in a long time.

[NoraB]

Since October before this I was at one point convinced I had alopecia, immediately followed by being convinced I had ALS and now this. It’s been the worst health anxiety spikes I’ve had in a long time.

I've pretty much gone through the entire encyclopaedia of diseases with my health anxiety. I'm talking over four decades here. Still alive and no horrors that I ever imagined for myself came to be. I have developed fibromyalgia, and a shit load of arthritis, but those are life affecting rather than terminal and HA generally goes with terminal, right? I can't get those years back but at least I finally have HA by the balls and I've been in control of HA for the last five years.:shades:

Constant checking just fuels the condition. Every time we do it we are feeding HA and firing off those stress hormones which in turn create unpleasant and unusual symptoms which directly feed into our imaginings that we are seriously ill. We're not ill, not physically anyway. We're in a high state of anxiety and when we've been stressed for long enough the fight or flight response gets jammed. Stress directly affects the digestive system. Think of those well known terms, 'sick to my stomach' 'worried sick'. Right? And we think it's bowel cancer or some other cancer because HA only deals in what will kill us or render us cabbages. We don't see what's staring us in the face. We don't apply the logic or reason and intelligence has nothing to do with it as the cleverest of humans can fall prey to HA. HA needs us to feel fear in order for it to exist and it is 100% convincing. Our thoughts and actions keep it alive so it's our thoughts and actions that need to change in order to kick it to the gutter..