In September 2021 I was diagnosed with stage 3 bowel cancer at the age of 32, I am now awaiting surgery.

I had been having symptoms for around 5 months, but I put these off thinking it was normal and it would pass. I was fatigued more than usual, I had irregular bowel movements and then I started seeing blood and mucus in my faeces.

My amazing family doctor referred me to a specialist and told me to make an appointment asap. I went private as the public system was too long of a wait. I was seen within 10 days and had a colonoscopy a week later. I had to pay for my procedure and appointments, I was even going to put it off because I couldn’t justify that amount of money.

When I awoke from my procedure, I was told he had found a lesion and he wanted me to get a CT scan. I was thinking okay a lesion mustn’t be too serious, I mean the surgeon didn’t sound overly concerned. He handed me a slip to get the scan which said 5cm lesion/tumour.

When I saw tumour I immediately started to panic but kept telling myself the surgeon would of said something if it was serious.

CT scan was a week later followed by MRI which confirmed I had 6.2cm tumour in my rectum.

3 weeks later I started radiation/chemo for 5 weeks then onto IV chemotherapy for four rounds .

This was so mentally challenging but I got through and have only just finished and I am now awaiting surgery.

I hope by sharing my story that it may help one person realise that maybe their symptoms aren’t normal and that cancer doesn’t discriminate.

I am a mother to three young children who lived a healthy life frequently exercised and ate well mostly, I never thought I would hear the word cancer and be thrown into this unknown world but here I am.