I hope this isn’t considered a medical thread, but an experience. Maybe this can help me cope as well as anyone else. Maybe even encourage someone to take advantage of the system
I’m male, 61, pretty good health, keen cyclist. According to my garmin stats my VO2 max is in the top 1% for my age and gender with a fitness age of “an excellent 20 year old” , if you can believe that sort of programmes. In September I got through my bowel screening kit , happened to need a poo so went and did it there and then . Sent it off and didn’t think any more about it.
Few days later I get the letter back through and instead of no problem it says they want to see me for some tests.
Those tests basically consisted of a colonoscopy plus various bloods. Still wasn’t too concerned, loads of reasons for a positive result and I’m fit and healthy.
Night before the colonoscopy wasn’t great. A preparation called plenvu empties your bowel, vigorously. If you’ve ever heard billy Connolly’s sketch where he’s drinking foreign tap water that gives you an idea.
Colonoscopy done and you get an instant result. They found a polyp that was described as looking angry. No wonder really, just been exposed, poked and biopsied.
10 days later results are in, I’ve got an appointment with a consultant and as soon as I walk into the room I know it’s not good. You don’t need three people to give good news. He confirms it’s cancerous.
The rest of that day was a blur, met many different people and had a CT scan to see if there was anything else hiding. Abnormalities were found in liver and spleen so a MRI scan was arranged to check them out. Fortunately they were classified as small benign cysts. I don’t know how they do it but they do.
They now know what they’re doing so surgery it is, they don’t need chemo to control things prior to an op . I’m fairly lean so they decide I’m a good candidate for keyhole. And that’s what happened on Tuesday. Again prepped the night before and first on the table on the Tuesday morning. Anaesthetic via a cannula in the back of the hand but also some form of opiate injection into the spine between L3/4. The surgeon looks like a child although she says she’s on roughly her 100th procedure. Make that 101 now.
Everything goes well apart from hitting a vein which shouldn’t have been where she was putting in one of the tools and meant the op took about 7 hours instead of 5.
She took away about 40cm of bowel from the left as well as all the lymph glands and blood supply to that area. She then rejoined the two ends of the bowel so I don’t have a stoma. She’s confident she’s got everything but is going to recommend chemo, she thinks one of the lymph glands looks suspicious and expects pathology to confirm that.
Right now I feel like I’ve been kicked repeatedly by a horse. I’m getting a pretty decent mix of painkillers but I’m able to get out of bed and doing circuits of the ward. They said try to do one, every few hours. I’m way past that.
The physical side of this is manageable, I’m struggling with the mental. 8 weeks ago I was in rude health, now I’m a patient, and not a particularly good one.
Yesterday, the first day after the op was great. I guess my system was still full of meds. Today hasn’t been so good. I’ve been awake since 3am with abdominal cramps and currently relaxing due to a shot of liquid morphine. That stuff should be in boots
I am however grateful that I did that test early and this got caught fairly early. Bowel cancer is treatable and although I’m not out of the woods yet I’ve got about the best possible outcome I could have had at this stage. And all because of taking part in the screening. I suppose that’s the point of this. I’m not doing a poor me thread. If this encourages one person to take that test because they normally ignore it it will be worth it. If I hadn’t the surgeon says I’d have had three years.
The NHS has been awesome. I can’t fault the treatment I’ve had. I’ve also got BUPA but when I ran this past them they couldn’t get me through the system any quicker.
I’m male, 61, pretty good health, keen cyclist. According to my garmin stats my VO2 max is in the top 1% for my age and gender with a fitness age of “an excellent 20 year old” , if you can believe that sort of programmes. In September I got through my bowel screening kit , happened to need a poo so went and did it there and then . Sent it off and didn’t think any more about it.
Few days later I get the letter back through and instead of no problem it says they want to see me for some tests.
Those tests basically consisted of a colonoscopy plus various bloods. Still wasn’t too concerned, loads of reasons for a positive result and I’m fit and healthy.
Night before the colonoscopy wasn’t great. A preparation called plenvu empties your bowel, vigorously. If you’ve ever heard billy Connolly’s sketch where he’s drinking foreign tap water that gives you an idea.
Colonoscopy done and you get an instant result. They found a polyp that was described as looking angry. No wonder really, just been exposed, poked and biopsied.
10 days later results are in, I’ve got an appointment with a consultant and as soon as I walk into the room I know it’s not good. You don’t need three people to give good news. He confirms it’s cancerous.
The rest of that day was a blur, met many different people and had a CT scan to see if there was anything else hiding. Abnormalities were found in liver and spleen so a MRI scan was arranged to check them out. Fortunately they were classified as small benign cysts. I don’t know how they do it but they do.
They now know what they’re doing so surgery it is, they don’t need chemo to control things prior to an op . I’m fairly lean so they decide I’m a good candidate for keyhole. And that’s what happened on Tuesday. Again prepped the night before and first on the table on the Tuesday morning. Anaesthetic via a cannula in the back of the hand but also some form of opiate injection into the spine between L3/4. The surgeon looks like a child although she says she’s on roughly her 100th procedure. Make that 101 now.
Everything goes well apart from hitting a vein which shouldn’t have been where she was putting in one of the tools and meant the op took about 7 hours instead of 5.
She took away about 40cm of bowel from the left as well as all the lymph glands and blood supply to that area. She then rejoined the two ends of the bowel so I don’t have a stoma. She’s confident she’s got everything but is going to recommend chemo, she thinks one of the lymph glands looks suspicious and expects pathology to confirm that.
Right now I feel like I’ve been kicked repeatedly by a horse. I’m getting a pretty decent mix of painkillers but I’m able to get out of bed and doing circuits of the ward. They said try to do one, every few hours. I’m way past that.
The physical side of this is manageable, I’m struggling with the mental. 8 weeks ago I was in rude health, now I’m a patient, and not a particularly good one.
Yesterday, the first day after the op was great. I guess my system was still full of meds. Today hasn’t been so good. I’ve been awake since 3am with abdominal cramps and currently relaxing due to a shot of liquid morphine. That stuff should be in boots
I am however grateful that I did that test early and this got caught fairly early. Bowel cancer is treatable and although I’m not out of the woods yet I’ve got about the best possible outcome I could have had at this stage. And all because of taking part in the screening. I suppose that’s the point of this. I’m not doing a poor me thread. If this encourages one person to take that test because they normally ignore it it will be worth it. If I hadn’t the surgeon says I’d have had three years.
The NHS has been awesome. I can’t fault the treatment I’ve had. I’ve also got BUPA but when I ran this past them they couldn’t get me through the system any quicker.
