Living with Colon Cancer

i have been reading about Colon Cancer, just for some answers, and a lot of the articles do not seem to relate to my current situation, so if anyone will read my story, please comment back with some answers.

Some facts about Colon (bowel/colorectal) cancers
36,700 people are diagnosed with colorectal cancer in the UK each year. Excluding non melanoma skin cancer, this makes colorectal cancer the 3rd commonest cancer overall. It is the 2nd commonest affecting women (after breast cancer). About 22,700 of these 36,700 colorectal cancers are large bowel (colon) cancers and the rest are back passage (rectum) cancers.
SYMPTOMS
* Bleeding from the back passage (rectum) or blood in your stools
* A change in normal bowel habits towards diarrhoea or looser stools that lasts longer than 6 weeks
* A lump that your doctor can feel in the right side of your abdomen, or in your rectum
* A straining feeling in the rectum
* Losing weight
* Pain in your abdomen or rectum
* Anaemia (a low level of red blood cells)


Most cases of Colon cancer need an operation, to remove the tumour or part of the bowel. Most are given advice or at least the choice of whether they want this kind of operation. Most are left with a colostomy or ileostomy before the operation and before signing that form. Me, i was admitted into hospital with severe pains, given Morphine, and told they would operate on me to see what was causing the pain. nobody warned me about what kind of operation. Did they neglect to tell me or was so high on morphine i had no idea what was going on. When i woke up, still in pain, they told me then that i had my bowel removed due to an unknown blockage. And i also had a Stoma now. 'Would i like to look at it' they asked. I was not prepared for the next few months of what this Stoma would now control my life. When i posted my fears on twitter, i had the colon cancer profile posting lots of articles or links but it may as well be written in Chinese as me, being the patient, do not know the medical jargon he was posting.

When i went to the doctor who was to discharge me from the chemo, he said do i have any questions. My mind went blank. I had questions for the past few months rotating round my head, but there and then i just went DUH!.

But i did have this same problem when i had problems with my liver. All the GP gave me was some links to a website, again, reading it left me more confused than before. Are GPs so useless or just can not be bothered to actually discuss it with the patient. Why does the Doctor ask the patient if they have any questions before discussing their condition. Of course the patient has questions, but they have so many swirling around their brain, their brain shuts down once they are in the GP's surgery. The GP should actually discuss their condition without the need to ask the poor confused patient if they have any questions.

And as for fitting the criteria of having Colon cancer, I ate almost healthily, was not a fan of too many cakes and fatty foods, ate a lot of vegetables, loved the healhty stir fry, and ate less meat than most people. not a regular drinker except on vacation or xmas, so any of these factors again dont relate to me. Also, this kind of cancer has not ventured into my family genes before so, again, makes me wonder what is the cause.