A mom has opened up about being diagnosed with stage three cancer in her 30s in the hope of warning others after she ignored one 'embarrassing' symptom for months.
Jelena Tompkins, from Colorado, US, was just 34 years old when she first began to notice changes to her body in 2016, but at first, she wasn't too worried because she was generally in 'some of the best shape of [her] life'.
"I ate healthily and never thought that cancer would strike me at such a young age," she said while speaking to The Patient Story.
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Jelena was an avid runner and ate plenty of vegetables in her diet; something which she called to mind when she first noticed what she eventually learned was a symptom of her cancer.
The mom realized that her gas had started to smell worse than usual, but rather than visiting a doctor, she began taking probiotics to improve her gut bacteria.
The smell didn't improve, but Jelena didn't grow really concerned until she noticed blood in her stool.
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A few months later at her annual check-up, she told her doctor about the blood.
Doctors initially suspected Jelena's diet was to blame, and three months later, they began doing tests to see if a certain food was upsetting her digestive system.
The tests prompted a colonoscopy, and it was this which sadly revealed she had stage 3 rectal cancer.
The mom began treatment, and went through 28 days of radiation and oral chemotherapy, followed by surgery to remove the tumor.
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She ended up having 12 inches of her colon removed, as well as 17 lymph nodes, leaving just five cancerous nodes remaining.
After that, Jelena had an ileostomy - a procedure in which a small hole is made in the abdomen and a piece of ileum is brought out through the hole to create a stoma. Once she finished her final round of chemotherapy, Jelena had her ileostomy reversed.
Thankfully the mom, who had no family history of cancer, is now in remission, but she still undergoes maintenance chemotherapy and annual scans.
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"I went in, at first, every 3 months for CT scans and checking my CEA and my bloodwork to make sure all my blood counts were bouncing back," she told The Patient Story.
"Eventually, it got strung out to every 6 months, every year, and now I am just going in once a year for follow-up blood work and to check in with my oncologist."
Jelena has credited social media with helping her navigate the tough ordeal, saying: "I connected with so many others that had either finished treatment or were going through treatment at the same time as myself to just have that support group and know I wasn’t the only young woman that was going through this."
Jelena has shared her story and continues to share updates on her health to encourage others not to ignore potential symptoms.
Emily Brown