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When Jenna Scott, then 31, was about seven months pregnant, she began to experience disturbing symptoms: rectal bleeding, nausea and abdominal pain. Her doctor assured her that the hemorrhoids and discomfort were only part of the pregnancy. When her symptoms did not go away after giving birth, she learned the shocking news: she had stage 4 colorectal cancer.
“I don’t understand how this happened to me and someone my age,” Scott, now 34, of Norcross, Ga., Told TODAY. “Cancer was not in my world.”
Scott shares his story to educate young people of color about colorectal cancer.
“I’m really focused on getting the word out to my community, the black community, because we don’t really talk about it,” she said. “We don’t really go to doctors like we should and access to health care is not as easy.”
Pregnancy symptoms never went away
When Scott started feeling nauseous and bleeding during her pregnancy in 2017, she worried. But her OB-GYN put her at ease by saying that what she went through was normal.
“He said, ‘Well, that just comes with the territory of pregnancy,’” Scott recalls. “I just bored him. Until my son was born and nothing stopped. I was still in pain.
She tried different types of birth control pills and still felt bad. Shortly after her son Cameron’s first birthday, she went to her primary care doctor, who listened to her concerns, performed blood tests, which was normal, and recommended that she see a gastrointestinal doctor, who ordered a colonoscopy.
“I told him what was going on, and he just looked at me and said, ‘You’re in good physical shape. You are really young. We don’t know what it is, but just rule out anything serious. That’s why I had a colonoscopy, ”she said.
When she woke up from the procedure, the doctor told her what he had found and she didn’t believe him.
“He told me I had cancer,” Scott said. “We had built such a good rapport until then, I laughed and laughed… and I said, ‘Seriously?’ I thought he was playing and then he just had a straight face. And he said, ‘I would never joke about something like that.’ “
Then Scott felt “numb”. While doctors originally believed she caught it early, Scott later learned that she had stage 4 cancer.
“Things went in one ear and came out of the other,” she said. “The doctor said, ‘Well your situation is extremely rare because we can’t even get the best images on your CT scan because you don’t have enough body fat. “”
This was particularly frustrating for Scott. She was athletic, young, and ate healthy foods – anything she thought would protect her from colorectal cancer.
“I know it sounds funny but I got mad at my body. I was like, “What are you doing to me?” She said. “I was like, ‘I take so much care of you and you treat me that way.’ I did not register myself in the “bubble” of people who would normally correspond to this type of disease. “”
Colorectal cancer in young adults
While colorectal cancer in young adults remains rare, the American Cancer Society estimates that approximately 18,000 people under the age of 50 were diagnosed with colorectal cancer in 2020. Since the mid-1980s, there has been a Colon cancer increase in adults ages 20 to 39 and the number of people aged 40 to 54 has been increasing since the mid-1990s, according to the organization.
Blacks suffer from colorectal cancer at rates about 20% higher than non-Hispanic whites and have death rates nearly 40% higher, according to the American Cancer Society. The organization SurvivorNet launched Closing the Gap to raise awareness of racial disparities in cancer diagnosis, treatment and survival.
Symptoms of colorectal cancer include:
- Rectal bleeding
- Iron deficiency
- Abdominal pain
- Narrow stools
- A desire to have a bowel movement
- Unexplained weight loss
Share your story to help others
Scott, who initially shared his story with SurvivorNet, felt it was important to talk about his experience so that other young people didn’t feel so alone. In support groups, she is often the youngest. She spends time mentoring younger people with colorectal cancer to help them get through this experience.
“When you go to your chemotherapy infusion, there is nobody your age,” she says. “It’s just hard when you don’t really have someone like you or your age to ask, ‘Well, how did you deal with this?’ ‘
After her initial diagnosis, Scott underwent rigorous chemotherapy and she also underwent surgery that removed a foot from her colon, two parts of her liver, and her gallbladder. She developed a rare side effect where infected fluid collected in her chest, back, and abdomen and had to have it drained.
“It was difficult,” she says. “I would be in the tub maybe five times a day because the hot water was my only relief from the terrible pain.”
She finished the chemotherapy but nine months later the cancer returned and it spread to her liver and lungs. Again, Scott underwent rigorous chemotherapy and developed a rash on his face. She also underwent targeted therapy and two liver and lung surgeries. Sometimes stress and loneliness get to him.
“I’ve only met three other people since my diagnosis who were young like me and they’re all across the country,” Scott said. “It’s a terrible thing and we don’t really have a lot of resources to prevent this from happening.”
Scott will be on chemotherapy for the rest of his life to keep the cancer from spreading. Although she has undergone numerous therapies with sometimes severe side effects, she remains strong for Cameron and her husband, Derrick.
“There were two things I asked when I was going through the worst: Could I please just watch my son grow up and grow old with my husband?” she said. “They’re what I’m focusing on.”
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