Not Another Diagnosis - Crohn’s and

 Getting a Crohn's diagnosis can be a lot to handle. Being told that the doctors have found something else's feels like all the air has been pulled from the room. During my routine colonoscopy the endoscopist said they had seen something. My first thought was "Oh God. Not another diagnosis."

My second thought was the C word. Cancer. My grandad died from cancer when I was 10 years old. People with IBD are more likely to get colon cancer than people who don't have IBD. Before you continue reading - The doctors don't think it is but they haven't ruled it out yet.

You know those appointments that typically take months to get, I have been scheduled for 3 in the last month. Trying to side step people asking why I am going to hospital so much by saying it's just test, routine test, end of year test.

I have been poked, prodded, and drawn so much blood I have started to calculate how much I could have donated if I was allowed (people with anemia are not allowed to give). These days to be able to refuse an examination, feels like a boon when the doctor says it's not necessary, he can do it, but it wouldn't tell him anything they haven't seen on the scope

The consultant I spoke with at my appointment, was wearing scrubs that showed his chest hair, it was slightly distracting as he said, he doesn't think it cancer. But the Gastro team have to do a patient conference after all these tests first to determine a disgnosis. A glimmer of hope tempered by the lack of certainty.

I had spent 2 weeks on edge expecting the other foot to drop, it hadn't come down but it hadn't gone either.

I can't tell (don't want to tell) people that the doctors have found something. That's a lot of explaining that I don't know what it is, to people who will ask questions, I don't have answers to. I don't even know if I can definitely say it is not the C word, because that hasn't been confirmed.

Even telling my brother had me hesitating. Telling someone that the doctors think something is wrong but they don't know what it is, so don't do research, don't try to guess my symptoms, don't tell people because I don't want to have to explain myself to well meaning but intrusive family and friends. Honestly I find it easier talking about Crohn's symptoms to people on the street.

These are questions I thought on, cried on, slept on, since getting the news. My routine colonoscopy that should have been a set and forget for another few years, has effectively put my life on hold. I feel like I am holding my breathe waiting to exhale. This diagnosis could determine determine the rest of my year or even years.

My life that had been going well. The year I was feeling mentally healthier, physically healthier, and I was living a more balanced life is effectively on pause as I wait for confirmation.

I try to stick to a routine. I try to keep working, and meeting up with friends, but I am so afraid. I keep having recouring sense of finality to everything. I know it isn't the end but I can't shake my fear of what the future looks like (I don't even want to admit that I've had this thought to myself). I understand that life is what happens as you wait so I am trying to still live my life. I'm trying to stay excited for new beginnings.

Some days I forget and think it was a bad dream, then I get mail from the hospital and I feel like screaming. I don't, because that would scare my family but small shrieks have escaped.

As I write this waiting for my EUA and biopsy, I think how odd my life is. I have started marking time passing with hospital appointments. Life is the thing I am playing at, as I wait for my next appointment. Suddenly it feels like a whole year has passed in 4 weeks,. I have been to the hospital more times in these weeks than in the last 2 years combined. I just need to get through this part.

The doctors don't know what's wrong and I don't want to get overly worked up if it is nothing. So I sit, and wait, with bated breathe for another diagnosis.

Wondering if I'll ever have time to see Renaissance in cinema.