Woman in Her 30s Was Told She Had Hemorrhoids. It Was Actually Stage 3 Cancer.

When you’re sick and you know something is off in your body, it’s infuriating and anxiety-inducing to hear “you’re fine” and “nothing’s wrong” from doctors. Countless times, I’ve had my symptoms brushed off when there was actually something wrong. 

Such was the case for Brooks Bell, a woman who learned she had colorectal cancer at age 38, after her symptoms were brushed off as hemorrhoids by two doctors.

When Bell first noticed she had blood in her stool, she immediately contacted her doctor, who told her it was probably just internal hemorrhoids. So, she went on as if nothing was wrong, she explained to The Post.

When the blood didn’t go away, she sought a second opinion. “She didn’t find a hemorrhoid, but still thought that’s what it was,” Bell said of her second doctor, who prescribed her cortisone cream.

Eventually, Bell had enough—she didn’t trust that her issue was as simple as hemorrhoids.

“If you’re bleeding, you can’t be healthy,” she told The Post. “I needed to get to the bottom of it, so I decided to get a third opinion. I cold-called a gastroenterologist.”

Finally, she was able to get a colonoscopy, which she said is what she wanted from the start.

“But I had this voice in my head saying, ‘Don’t be dramatic. Don’t be a hypochondriac. Don’t be that girl who runs straight to the scary thing.’”

I think many of us can relate to that feeling after constant invalidation. It’s easy to assume you’re overreacting, especially for those of us who experience health anxiety on a regular basis.

No one knows your body the way you do, though. If you feel something is wrong, trust the feeling.

Thankfully, Bell pushed for a third opinion after being misdiagnosed by her two previous doctors—a decision that saved her life. 

Unfortunately, it took going through three different doctors to learn she had stage 3 colon cancer. What’s more? If she had waited any longer, her tumor might have spread deeper into her colon wall, lowering her chances of survival by around 20 percent.

“My life wasn’t over, but it just changed forever,” she told The Post of her diagnosis. “The ‘Big C’ is now attached to me, and that will never be different.”

Bell is now cancer-free, and she dedicates her time to spreading awareness about colon cancer. In fact, along with another young colorectal cancer survivor, she even co-founded a fashion brand called Worldclass, which seeks to break the stigma around colon cancer as well as push for early screenings.

“The bottom line is colonoscopies prevent colon cancer,” Bell told The Post. 

“You’ve got to push [for screenings],” she added. “Doctors aren’t bad people, and it’s not that they don’t care… but for you as a patient, that time might be the difference between life and death.”