Hello Violet,

I hope one of the nurses can get in touch soon.

I am not an expert, but I am a bit of a drama queen when it comes to health and I am not proud of this, but I call/see so many doctors for different opinions. The doctors can tell when I am anxious and reassure me a lot. I can't imagine them saying they are 'looking for something nasty' to me. If anything, they downplay so I don't become dramatic.

For example, I had blood in my poo and the doctor said she couldn't find anything when she examined me so she gave a FIT test and said 'here is a gift from me, this is a test that looks for blood in your poo'. It came positive so the doctor called me and said 'blood was found in your poo, but we already knew this'. She said that it's time to do a process of elimination to find out what could be causing it, so she'll refer me to specialists.

If she had worded it differently and said 'looking for something nasty', I definitely would be freaking out. I hope your cousin's doctor didn't word it like that. I feel it is unlikely but of course, I am not an expert so I hope a nurse gets in touch with you soon.

Hi Amelia, thank you for replying.  I am inclined to agree with you that a Doctor would be highly unlikely to tell a patient that they are 'looking for something nasty' until all their tests have been completed.  It has been my experience that Doctors tend to downplay things until they are absolutely sure of what they are dealing with.  Violet.

Hello there

I am so sorry we haven't been in touch sooner but it seems your post didn't come through to us.

It can be a worrying time going through tests and not getting answers so I am sure this cannot be easy for your cousin.

I don't know if she has found out any more by now but let's hope the doctors are able to get to the bottom of this pain soon.

Sometimes doctors say things that can be misunderstood or taken the wrong way. As you say most doctors cannot say for sure what is going on until all the tests have been done. There may be times when the doctors have concerns or suspicions and may say we also need to rule out something more serious, sinister or nasty but this doesn't mean that the person has cancer.

I hope this helps.

All the best to you and your cousin

Take care

Naomi