How rest days saved my life...sort of.

For me, this week will go down in the books as one that will probably be life-changing. I apologize in advance for the long-winded post. But it’s worth it if I help at least one person with this…

So I’ll start at the beginning… Back in November, I had started noticing on my rest days that I was getting terrible stomach cramps, usually accompanied by bouts of diarrhea (sorry, TMI, but it’s part of the story). It worried me a little because I’ve been on the Depo shot for around 5 years now, so I get neither periods nor cramps anymore.
In early January, I hit my deductible for the year on my health insurance, so I figured “Hey, why not go get these cramps checked out since I don’t have to pay for it now”. Thank God I did.

Jump to early February. I had been through a myriad of tests with my regular physician and after not finding anything, she referred me to a Gastroenterologist. They started out with the normal blood tests, CT scans, etc. Still nothing. So last week, I was scheduled for my first colonoscopy at the ripe old age of 25 (yeah, I just turned 25 in December). Once the doctor was done with the procedure, she told me in the recovery room “I didn’t see anything alarming, I’m thinking you just have a simple case of IBS, especially since you’re just a baby. My youngest granddaughter is older than you!...But we’ll call you next week once everything comes back for sure.”

Fast forward to Monday of this week. I get a phone call from her office asking if I can come in that day at 4:30 to get my test results. I was sitting at work when I got the call and I hesitated to leave early on such short notice, once I expressed this to the nurse, she said calmly “It’s very urgent, you NEED to come in today.” Uh oh.
Once I get into the exam room, I see a bunch of images from my colonoscopy sitting on the doctor’s desk. I could tell something wasn’t right before she even explained them to me. Once she came into the room, she starts explaining the images to me with words like “dysplasia”, “irregular cells”, “rare condition”, and “colon resectioning” and then puts it all into English.

Holy hell. I am in Stage 0 colon cancer at the age of 25 and I’m on track to getting part of my colon removed in the next month.

We had a discussion where she explained that these types of cells are incredibly rare in someone my age, let alone with someone in great shape and NO history of colon problems in either side of my family. She also said how people normally never have symptoms of colon cancer until it’s formed into at least Stage I or Stage II cancers, which are harder to catch completely without radiation or chemotherapy. She’s amazed that I was so in tune with my body that I could tell something was wrong when most people don’t catch this type of thing until it’s too late.

Mind blown.

She believes that I only noticed it on my rest days because the digestive system works harder & faster on days where strenuous exercise takes place. The slow down in my digestive system allowed for my body to (somehow) detect that something wasn’t right.

I can’t help but think what would’ve happened to me if I hadn’t have been on a regular exercise schedule for the last 3 years, and hadn’t noticed this on my rest days and actually brought it up to my doctor. I could’ve written it off as a weird food allergy or just something annoying thing my body was doing on my off days.

So I’ll be traveling to the Cancer Center Monday morning to see my Oncologist (never thought I would say those words in my life) to discuss removing my stage 0 colon cancer and a sizeable portion of my colon at the age of 25.

I’m not entirely sure how I feel about all of this yet, I feel like it’s still sinking in. It’s one of those things that you see on TV and think “Wow, that sucks.” There is a certain amount of anger and bitterness because I’ve been devoted to being as healthy as I can be for awhile now, and this still happens. You see people who treat their body like trash who never have health problems. It just doesn’t seem fair.

I’m not really sure what the moral of my story is (or how it will end). But I really want to stress the importance of listening to your own body and speaking up when you think something isn’t right. The doctors were hesitant to schedule a colonoscopy for me because of my age, but while meeting with my doctor she said that she will never hesitate to give someone under the age of 35 a colonoscopy ever again. So I guess that’s a plus.