You may be interested in the events that led up to me hearing the other C word and "you have" in the same sentence.
In September 2010 I got a little sick, had some gastrointestinal cramping, weight loss, small amounts of blood during bowel movements and runny poo (remember I lived in China though, I didn't remember what normal poo was). My mate and I were performing in schools in southern China and so at the time I just put it down to dodgy dumplings.
From October to December I was busy building a science communication empire. We were quite famous in Beijing and our egos grew accordingly.
On 3 January 2011 I flew from Beijing to Melbourne to sort out my Chinese visa and have a colonoscopy as the cramping and bleeding had continued off and on since September. The colonoscopy revealed a lesion in my sigmoid colon and pathology revealed that it was a malignant adenocarcinoma (malignant means cancer; adenocarcinoma is the medical term given to a tumour that begins growing in a cell layer that produces mucous - the colon has lots of these cell types). I had bowel cancer.
A CT scan (the time-portal machine to the right) revealed no other tumours around my colon or in my liver or lungs. The doctors were particularly interested in the lungs and liver because these are common places that colon cancers spread to.
Knowing that we only had the one tumour to worry about was a huge relief.
A floppy sigmoid and a greedy tumour meant that it had grown outside the bowel wall and attached to the rectum. Because of this I had radiochemotherapy, major open surgery, a loop ileostomy and then four months of adjuvant chemotherapy.
I developed dangerous blood clots that were detected after chemotherapy and spent a year on anticoagulant therapy.
I had check-ups every 3 months for 5 years and now have check-ups every 6 months. I am still alive.
In September 2010 I got a little sick, had some gastrointestinal cramping, weight loss, small amounts of blood during bowel movements and runny poo (remember I lived in China though, I didn't remember what normal poo was). My mate and I were performing in schools in southern China and so at the time I just put it down to dodgy dumplings.From October to December I was busy building a science communication empire. We were quite famous in Beijing and our egos grew accordingly.
On 3 January 2011 I flew from Beijing to Melbourne to sort out my Chinese visa and have a colonoscopy as the cramping and bleeding had continued off and on since September. The colonoscopy revealed a lesion in my sigmoid colon and pathology revealed that it was a malignant adenocarcinoma (malignant means cancer; adenocarcinoma is the medical term given to a tumour that begins growing in a cell layer that produces mucous - the colon has lots of these cell types). I had bowel cancer.
A CT scan (the time-portal machine to the right) revealed no other tumours around my colon or in my liver or lungs. The doctors were particularly interested in the lungs and liver because these are common places that colon cancers spread to.Knowing that we only had the one tumour to worry about was a huge relief.
A floppy sigmoid and a greedy tumour meant that it had grown outside the bowel wall and attached to the rectum. Because of this I had radiochemotherapy, major open surgery, a loop ileostomy and then four months of adjuvant chemotherapy.
I developed dangerous blood clots that were detected after chemotherapy and spent a year on anticoagulant therapy.
I had check-ups every 3 months for 5 years and now have check-ups every 6 months. I am still alive.
Hi Ben,
ReplyDeleteMy name is Anuj Agarwal. I'm Founder of Feedspot.
I would like to personally congratulate you as your blog Ben B. Brave has been selected by our panelist as one of the Top 20 Bowel Cancer Blogs on the web.
http://blog.feedspot.com/bowel_cancer_blogs/
I personally give you a high-five and want to thank you for your contribution to this world. This is the most comprehensive list of Top 20 Bowel Cancer Blogs on the internet and I’m honored to have you as part of this!
Also, you have the honor of displaying the badge on your blog.
Best,
Anuj