Symptoms of the Universe

This post is all about the symptoms I had leading up to diagnosis.

Back in 2015 I built my wife her dream home here in southern Minnesota so that she could be out in the country and closer to her family. For me it meant peace and quiet, being closer to the office and not having to comute in the big city (Twin Cities Metro) during rush hour.

Not to long after moving to Faribault, I lost my job and found myself starting up yet another new business. It didn’t take too long and I was up and running doing business development consulting.

I’ve owned three IT companies, a credit consulting firm and helped out with my wife’s business (gift and craft store called The Counrty Cardinal) so I was no stranger to starting, building and selling businesses so I simply jumped back into the game since we had bills to pay and a new mortgage that wasn’t gonna wait around while I searched for a new “job-job”.

Since I typically spend ALL my time working, I wasn’t in the best of shape. I smoked too much, ate crap (fast food) and got no exercise so, I began going for walks with my wife in the new neighborhood, cut back on smoking and began eating better.

I began to notice severe cramping and losing weight uncommon with simple exercising. Actually though, before I lost my job I began losing weight for a few months leading up to that “life event” at a rate of 10 lbs a month.

I just figured it was due to being out of shape and not eating so much crap. I didn’t pay too much attention to it until I began having changes in my bowel movements and then one day I started having rectal bleeding.

That kinda freaked me out but, I thought maybe I was just wiping too hard…or something. A few days later I pissed out a ton of blood, chunks of who knows what and that sent me over the edge so, naturally I dashed off to the local hospital (ER) to get checked out.

A nurse walked me to the bathroom to give a urine sample and there it was, more blood and some chunks of flesh shooting out. OMG…I almost puked and dropped to my knees in pain.

She said “Yup….that’s blood clots dude!” As a woman, she said she knew exactly what that was but didn’t know why my bladder would be bleeding so they did some scans and said everything looked great. Due to my severe dehydration (I only drank coffee and nothing else – not even water), they said it’s possible for my bladder to dry up, crack and start bleeding.

I’ve never heard of this but given that I took a piss once every two or three days, I figured they were right and, I was sent home with instructions to give it a few days and if it happened again, to come back or go get a referral from my doctor to a urologist who could do a endoscopy.

Long story short, it never happened again…although I was scared to death to urinate for at least a month. But I was soon distracted with rectal bleeding again so, I went into the ER when I crapped out a lot of blood.

Once again, the attending physician (who was proctologist – what are the odds??) told me (after a quickie….rectal exam) that it was an internal hemorrhoid and not to worry about it. It’s NOT cancer….I was “too young” for that. I was 48 and yes, people get hemorrhoids……SO, he sent me home with some suppositories and some pain meds.

He basically explained that hemorrhoids are engorged blood vessels that will fill up with blood, burst and repeat that cycle time and time again so….no worries. I ignored it thinking it was normal.

Then, on July 1st (2017) I thought I was having a heart attack and went into the ER to get checked out. So, quick note….in 2012 I had a massive heart attack and had heart surgery leaving me with three stents in my right coronary artery.

So, when I was having chest pains I rushed into the ER. After going through all their tests, they said something was definitely going on but I wasn’t having a massive heart attack. I was sent home with instructions to follow up with my heart surgeon to see if something was going on.

My heart surgeon wanted to do an angiogram to see if there was any blockages or something more serious going on. Well, given I know what an angiogram is and what they do if they do find clogging or a blockage…..they put in a stent and put you on Plavix (an anti-coagulant / blood thinner) which prevents you from clotting.

So my only question was, will I bleed to death out of my ass!? His question to me was, what the hell is going on with your ass? I mentioned that I think I have a large internal hemorrhoid that should get snipped out of me but, that I’ve been ignoring it.

He said he would have a GI take a look at me and if it needs to be removed, he could do it there and, hand me back to my heart surgeon for the angiogram.

So I explained my symptoms to the GI and he ordered a CT (abdomen and pelvic region) scan and MRI. So July 3rd I was admitted and made to wait (due to the 4th of July holiday) for July 5th to roll around and… I was the first to go in for the scans at 7:30 am.

At 8 am the GI came back stating he was seeing a huge mass around my “rectal column” and needed to do an emergency colonoscopy the next morning and…….that it looked like cancer. So I did the horrid evening prep and again was the first one on the table the next morning.

They asked me if I wanted to be awake or put to sleep for the procedure. I was in so much pain and tired as hell from going through the prep the night before that I simply said, knock me out so I can get some sleep.

The next thing I knew, I was waking up in the recovery area and some lady (a doctor with a strong Russian accent) came up to me…. yelling at me, asking why I waited so damn long to get checked out and, what the hell was wrong with me. In pure disgust she stormed out leaving me staring at the ceiling and a nurse holding my hand saying I’d be okay and not to pay too much attention to the doc’s comments.

Next thing I knew, I was back in my room awaiting the return of the GI. He arrived shortly thereafter telling me that this was in NO way a hemorrhoid and that it was a HUGE tumor that was wrapped completely around the rectal column and a few centimeters from joining up on the other side.

The bleeding I was experiencing was due to the tumor punching it’s way through the rectum and….. that all 21 lymph nodes were compromised and swollen. I was told that it was probably late stage 4 colorectal cancer (CRC) and that unless I did something about this, I wouldn’t have more than 6-9 months to live.

Well, that was pretty devastating news to say the least. My wife, my son, my dad…..were all devastated to hear this news. I was in shock, I didn’t know what to say or do. I mean, I’ve faced death before (many times) but have always pulled through (I must have a phenomenal guardian angle) but this time was different….I was given a timeline.

Six to nine months huh? Hmm, so, I can go home and “think about it”? Yup… and that’s what I did. I thought about what my family would go through if I simply gave up and begun making “final arrangements”. But of course, having SO much to live for, I knew in my heart I was gonna fight this with every ounce of my being.

So in the meantime (between July and August) of 2017, I researched the hell out if this (didn’t find much about “rectal” cancer) and met with my oncologist and colorectal cancer surgeon to go over treatment options to shrink up the tumor and, was told about some robot that was gonna rip my innards out and that I would be crapping into a bag until I healed up and they could put me back together again.

So, I’ll get into treatment options, challenges I faced and, the financing of saving my life in another post. For now, the takeaway here should really be this….DON’T ignore your symptoms! If you have a change in bowel movements, cramping, bleeding or even unexplained weight loss, get it checked out!

I don’t care what “age” you are, if you are having symptoms or have a history of colon cancer in your family, GET SCREENED!

Almost every colorectal cancer patient or survivor I’ve met say the same thing, “I was misdiagnosed with having hemorrhoids”. And like me, they ignored it until it was too late. Well, to late to “catch it early” anyway. You may have to battle the docs, the insurance company and other “experts” but if you feel there is something wrong and you want a screening, fight for it….or you just may be fighting for your life later on.

Again, those of you with a family history (colon cancer), are having symptoms and especially if you’re 45 years of age or older, get screened. It’s the one cancer that can be prevented (polyp removal) or at least, if caught early enough, can be much easier to deal with than if you end up with stage IV colorectal cancer.

On a brighter note, now that I’ve turned fifty AND, that they finally changed / lowered the screening age to 45, I’ve been able (so far) to encourage many of my friends, family and school mates to get screened for colorectal cancer.

I’ve also been doing magazine interviews, online interviews, TV interviews and doing as much as I can to raise awareness of colorectal cancer. I’ll post some links to these when I get a chance.

March was Colorectal Cancer Awareness Month and I did what I could to help out but, every month should be CRC awareness month so….I decided to start up this blog, begin doing vlogs and I’m also starting up this podcast to provide valuable information to cancer patients, caregivers and healthcare professionals.

So feel free to check out the website, watch a few of the podcasts and join the effort if you can. I also encourage you to sign up for our monthly eNewsletter so that you can received news alerts and valuable information each month centered around colorectal cancer.

I also encourage you to leave a comment below, offer any ideas you might have on future podcasts or, participate in the discussions. Thanks again for your interest and support. Hope all is well and, have yourself a wonderful day. Chat soon!