Mass in rectum...

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Polarprincess
Posts: 793
Joined: Tue Aug 05, 2008 11:36 am

Re: Mass in rectum...

Postby Polarprincess » Tue Apr 28, 2009 7:07 am

It drives me crazy how doctors are always telling people to get on iron. unless you are severely anemic, iron is not always the best thing to be on especially if you were to get a diagnosis of cancer. The body shuts down our stores of iron for a reason in disease, and sometimes it is best not to take it as our bodies can actually use it against us. of course do not stop taking it if your doctor wants you to be ob it, but i definitely would discuss it with him/her.. even Dr Oz on oprah talks about this in his book.... hopefully yours indeed will turn out to be just hemorrhoids... keep us updated..
42 y/o Diagnosed Stage IIIa (T1 N1 of 26 M0) July 2008
LAR July 24 2008
Supposedly benign polyp with
invasive tubulovillous adenocarcinoma
12 cycles Fulfox
28 days chemoradiation
Finished April 20th 2009
Currently NED

MortalKombat
Posts: 18
Joined: Tue Apr 14, 2009 1:49 pm

Re: Mass in rectum...

Postby MortalKombat » Tue Apr 28, 2009 5:48 pm

***UPDATE***About 10 days into taking my iron tablets****

Well I went boxing tonight and felt better than I have for about a year, maybe two.

I finally mentioned to my mum about being anaemic and she said from the age of 13/14 people were always saying I was very white and that I bruised amazingly easy. So much so that she actually had a teacher phone home on a few occasions to check if I was being bullied after spotting bruises on my legs just from playing outdoors... that was all about 10 years ago now. I actually had a nickname when I started fighting 'ghost' cause I was so white and this was maybe 3 years ago...

I can't really tell if the hemmoroid treatment is working... The iron tablets make my stools black and clay like, so it's hard to judge my bowel movements at the moment. I do think that my stools seem wider (after 7 days treatment), maybe now like 3/4 times the pencil thin size they were before... Unsure whether or not this means anything though... might be cause the stools are harder/clay like they pass differently. I havn't had any stomach pains or gas or blood in my stools since going to the doctors ten days ago...

I guess I am having a good day, I feel more positive because I have energy for a change... I am breathing normally (rather than shallow breaths) and I was able to train 2 hours of boxing without feeling I had run a marathon... Which over the last few months has been near impossible... I do realise that the two treatments could just be masking something so I am going to persue this until I get scoped no matter what... but it is nice to have a day where I am about to head to bedsmiling, rather than near tears like the last few weeks.

Thanks guys.

MortalKombat
Posts: 18
Joined: Tue Apr 14, 2009 1:49 pm

Re: Mass in rectum...

Postby MortalKombat » Thu Apr 30, 2009 11:00 am

Feeling good again today, did another 3 hours of training yesterday... I guess I should slow down cause I will probably burn out my iron stores through exercise and head down the low iron path again... :roll: I was reading an article, which said that up to 4% of male athletes have iron deficiency. I box about 15 hours a week (3 hours, 5 days a week) all pretty high intensity and I actually did a year (2008) professionally where I was training up to 36 hours a week (4-6 hours, 6 days a week)

But how much is the right amount? Sedentary males use about 1.0 mg per day for a wide variety of bodily functions. Sedentary females use a bit more, about 1.5 mg per day, because of monthly menstruation losses. Athletes use these sedentary amounts, plus a lot more.

An athlete sweats approximately 1.3 liters per hour while training on a medium sunny day. In that sweat he loses about 0.5 mg of iron per hour. If he trains real hard for 3 hours a day, the iron loss comes to 1.5 mg. Then there is loss by hemolysis (destruction of red blood cells). Heavy exercise breaks blood cells, the blood leaks and is then excreted from the body. Compression hemolysis, the crushing of blood cells by intense muscle contraction, occurs in almost any sport, running, swimming, cross-country skiing, bodybuilding, cycling, swiiming, rowing, etc. Its a potent source of iron loss in athletes.

If we add all the causes of iron loss for an athlete training heavy, 3 hours a day, it comes to:
Male Athletes: 3.5 mg
Female Athletes: 4.1 mg

Its quite a bit considering that only 10% of the iron in a good diet is bioavailable. Therefore to get sufficient iron a male athlete in heavy training requires a minimum of 36 mg of iron, and a female athlete 41 mg - every day.


Havn't really had many issues last few days... my stools (although black because of iron) seem pretty much normal size, but I had been using suppositories (prescribed to me) with iron (also prescribed) and therefore I don't like to judge my BM's right now. I think that if it was a tumour they would always been the same thin shape, where as hemmoroids would change shape the more I have to strain and this seems to be the case, but again... that's just my uneducated thoughts... I really need to stop thinking aye!? :P

Still got 18 days to go until my appointment, but trying to keep positive. I have read every single 'Colonder' story and think that it is selfish of me to get so upset and depressed when so many people have been through a lot worse and remained strong... which led the majority of them to get better. I think the most important thing I got from them were to keep positive, smile and know that whatever happens you are willing to fight through it. If you get upset, depressed, think you are beyond cure it doesn't seem to do any good. I also enjoyed the article about 'miracles' found that interesting... whether God or a positive outlook... something is making those amazing figures.

Not sure how I would have coped mentally without this site... what a place!

MortalKombat
Posts: 18
Joined: Tue Apr 14, 2009 1:49 pm

Re: Mass in rectum...

Postby MortalKombat » Mon May 18, 2009 5:48 am

I have my appointment with the GI in an hour... I'm a little nervous although really, really happy that the day has come. Because the mass is so close to my 'exit' I am sure he'll be able to see it / feel it and finally be able to tell me what it is... cancer, polyp, hemroid, whatever... at least I will finally know or be on the way to knowing.

I got two suppositories in the post which I guessed were some kind of lubricant (didn't bother with information sheet) popped them in and then 15 minutes thought... hmmm strange feeling this is... then I was running to the toilet and spent about an hour on there thinking what on Earth!? Finally thought it must be a reaction to the 'lubricant' so I dug the information sheet out of the trash in my room before legging it back to the toilet... Explination...? They were 'bisacodyl suppositories' and therefore a laxitive... next time I'll read the information... doh!!!

I'll let you know how I get on later :)

Lou
Posts: 74
Joined: Thu Feb 14, 2008 11:51 am
Location: Atlanta Area

Re: Mass in rectum...

Postby Lou » Mon May 18, 2009 7:15 am

hope all went well today and you have good news! :D

Lou
diag: 2-2-08
LAR 2-25-08
w/ temporary ileostomy
Tumor found early because of family history w/polyps and luck (feel extremely blessed)
reversal (CANCELLED!!!)
Breast Cancer DX:6-20-08
Lumpectomy 6-25-08
chemo & radiation done 12-08
Ileo takedown 2-09

MortalKombat
Posts: 18
Joined: Tue Apr 14, 2009 1:49 pm

GI Doctor is cool!

Postby MortalKombat » Mon May 18, 2009 8:47 am

Hey guys,

Just had an endoscophy (I think it is spelt), I walked in to 2 pretty hot nurses and a middle aged doctor who said right can you please tell me your symptoms? I had written them all down as follows:
1. Going to toilet 3-5 times a day
2. Constantly feeling sick / nausia
3. Bleeding on and off for at least a year, maybe 2
4. Low iron - which has caused shallow breathing, headaches and diziness
5. Mass in anus when straining
6. Pain in right side of stomach sometimes (I have broken the ribs on this side previously)

* I have taken 2 x iron tablets a day for 6 weeks and am feeling better
* I have taken hemroid treatment twice but it didn't help

He was really happy I'd wrote things down and kept the paper and added it to his file.

He said please follow my two nurses and they'll help you get ready for the prep. I said ok and they got my to take my trousers off and pull down my boxers to expose my ass... strangely I didn't feel at all nervous... just nervous as I spotted the size of the scope thing!!! So I was laying there with one nurse holding my head on a pillow and the doctor approaching with his scope before I felt the immense pain of the scope... I didn't actually expect any pain... but there was... a lot. Which afterwards I was told was a good thing. Then he said he was gonna pump air in me and again I felt pain and like I REALLY needed to go to the toilet... he spent a few minutes and then said ok, took it out and told me I could get dressed now.

He sat me down and said you deffinetly have piles which if they flare up and flare down would cause your stomach aches, multiple toilet trips and even your pain because if they stop you going or you resist the urge to go it will back up almost. I had heard all this before however so was a little worried he'd say "Nice meeting you, goodbye" at this point.

However he said, "I'm a little concerned you are anaemic because looking at you, you look a fit and in shape lad." He asked about my diet and said it seemed OK (I don't eat red meat though) and said what ever is causing it he wants to know why. He said it might be as simple as an inability to extract it from food, but he wants to rule out any kind of internal bleeding whether it's stomach related or not and he'd book me "a load of tests including a colonoscophy and if that is clear dietry related tests" to find out exactly what is going on...

I left the room and thought... oh crap... I need to go to the toilet, so I ran to toilet and went and got rid of all the gel stuff and saw it was mixed in with blood... I quickly went back and asked the doctor and he said that's good because the blood is coming from the area that he saw (because it was mixed with gel stuff) and that would mean that the blood I am seeing is from the piles he saw. I asked if that was why I was anaemic and he said no, it's blood, but not enough to make you anaemic.

So... I'm happy(ish)... my thoughts are I've only ever seen bright red blood... he saw where the bright red blood was coming from and that really does help me mentally feel better. I was worried the mass was a cancer and it obviously wasn't therefore I can stop freaking out about that... I'd say that is my two main symptoms gone (rectal bleeding and a protruding mass) so now it's just anaemia to find out and then I'm clear I guess.

I just want to say a big thank you to people here, you've really helped me with this. If it wasn't for you guys I would have never found out I was anaemic and I can't describe how bad I felt during my lowest times... like literally fainting on a few occasions... I'm only 6 weeks into iron treatment, but I'm feeling so much stronger already... hopefully I will get the rest of my tests done and then I'll be cleared :)

NWgirl
Posts: 6659
Joined: Sat Feb 02, 2008 3:24 am
Facebook Username: Belle Piazza
Location: Battle Ground, Washington

Re: Mass in rectum...

Postby NWgirl » Mon May 18, 2009 4:54 pm

Thank you for the update and the good news. The best news is it sounds like this doctor is taking your symptoms seriously and wants to get to the bottom of this (so to speak!). Good luck in getting this properly diagnosed and treated. Hopefully they can figure it out quickly and you can get some relief.
Belle - "Don't Retreat - Reload"DX 10/07 Stage III Rectal
Surgery 11/07; 27 of 38 nodes
Perm Colostomy 8/11
12/10 recurrence lungs & LN's
VATS Jan 2011
Radiation Oct 2013
Chemo for Life
2012 Colondar Model


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