Hello all so I’m new to this and I’m not sure if I’m doing this right I hopr I am though! Anyways let me start with some information about me, I’m a 19 year old female (turning 20 at the end of January) and I suffer from IBS and Health Anxiety.
Now my trouble actually began almost a month ago, I had some brown discharge immediately after my period ended which I tjen thought was Ovarian Cancer since I’ve heard it can be misdiagnosed as IBS. That went away after about a week, but as soon as that went away I began to have to urinate almost every 30 minutes and it would typically come out in very little amounts. So I went to an Urgent Care suspecting a UTI, I was given antibiotics for a UTI and even mentioned the brown discharge and doctor told me it was just from my period and nothing to worry about it it went away. Fast forward to me finishing my antibiotics ten days later, I no longer had to pee every 30 minutes but now whenever I do urinate my urine flow or stream is very very slow and I always feel as if there’s barely anything coming out. However this isn’t anything to do with my colon cancer scare, just something else I’ve been dealing with.
Anyway since I have IBS I’m used to switching between diarrhea and constipation, but usually it will go away for a while. It’s been two years since I was diagnosed with IBS and I really haven’t had much trouble with it up until now, during my panic of Ovarian Cancer I realized that I had constant diarrhea for about two weeks. It has now been maybe three to four and I still have diarrhea. I again started looking up symptoms on google (I know the dumbest thing to do) and began to start examining my stool, which lead me to discover that it has mucus in it.
Now I’ve always consireder having yellow stool as diarrhea and again it always goes away on it’s own, however it’s been consistent now this entire time and it always has mucus in it. I do not have any rectal bleeding that I’m aware of, but I did notice maybe the tiniest red spots on my stool one time but there was nothing on the toilet paper when I wiped so I didn’t think much of it. I also began to notice red like flakes (not sure what else to call them) not on the stool but also coming out with the stool, and very noticable on toilet paper. The consistency of it was not blood like though at all, and I did ask a doctor who told me it could just be undigested food and it has now stopped still scary though. But of course right now my biggest concerns are that I’ve switched between constipation and diarrhea non-stop, it’s mostly just diarrhea. My stools have been very loose and coming out in small pieces, not narrow but just small bits usually. I sometimes have abdominal pain but nothiny consistent or too bad.
The thing really making my anxiety worse is the fact that my uncle was just diagnosed with terminal cancer, and it was in fact colon cancer and his only symptoms were abdominal pain and constipation. I am also sure that another one of my uncles passed from colon cancer too, so the fact that it’s obviously in my family has me on edge. I know I’m still very young but that just makes my risk go up even higher, not only that but I’ve been reading about people getting misdiagnosed with IBS and it actually being colon cancer and at very young ages too! I know I shouldn't assume the worst but it’s very hard for me not to with my hypochondria and constant googling. But I just don’t know what else could be causing all of this anymore, I do have a doctors appointment coming up and I would love a colonscopy to put my mind at rest but my insurance does not cover it and I absolutely cannot pay out of pocket. I’m also not sure wether I should mention I have IBS or not, I definitely don’t want it to just be dismissed as my IBS acting up and not get any tests done.
Also what lead me here is reading several other people’s post about being scared of colon cancer. I am aware that everyone here are not medical professionals but I’d really love to be able to try and put my mind at ease. So please if anyone has any idea what could be causing this other than cancer, let me know because I’m driving myself crazy. I’ve spent so many hours of the day crying because I’ve completely convinced myself that I’m going to die.