I posted awhile back about symptoms

[Medic116]

a few weeks ago I posted about me having blood streaks in my stool for about 8 months. Well I was able to get into a doctor who said he wanted to do a colonoscopy. My colonoscopy was completed this morning. He found a polyp in my rectum about 2 inches up from my anus. He removed it, said he’s fairly sure it’s not pre cancerous but still sent it off. Other than that he said my colon was clear so that was a huge relief! It has been an eye opening experience for me only being 40 but I am going to pursue colonoscopies frequently now do to this. If I wouldn’t have done this one today who knows what may have happened.

has anyone else had experiences with polyps at 40 years old or younger?

Any advice for me going forward?

Thank you

[GCCA-Survivor Administrator]

Hi Medic116,

I don’t want to say my story is what you may have avoided 🤔😳, but I was stage 4 in 2012 and when I was on the good side of my fight my Oncologist said “you know that tumor we took out of you in 2012 was a polyp in 2006”. In 2012 I was 49. I never had a colonoscopy before that.

One thing I did even before my first chemo treatment was get generic testing. It told me I was in a hereditary situation known as Lynch Syndrome. I know my biomarkers and that helped tremendously with my treatment. I’ve been NED going on my 8th year👍.

I would say you should do that. Knowing if you have a hereditary situation is very beneficial. Get genetic testing. It’s a simple blood draw. Your GP can order it or outfits like 23andME and Ancestry.Com offer hereditary biomarker testing as well. There may be others out there that do this. Places like Lab Corp offer it as well. It could guide your surveillance procedures as you are already doing. Knowledge is power👍💪.

Congratulations on being proactive and finding things early👍. I wish I had done that.

Tom

[Dance22]

hi that’s good news and you’re on the right track, I’m in my second year of watch and wait , I had a polyp removed it was cancer but caught early, so I have regular check ups and doing just fine, I’m a lot older than you are but they’ll keep an eye on you , all the best x