It seems natural to want to believe that we are healthy and that everything is fine. But, what if every thing is not fine? What do you do when you really feel that something is not right? When you feel that you are not well? You go to the doctor. I recently heard a story:

A woman, we’ll call her Judy, started having stomach problems. She was young, in her late 30’s-early 40’s, and she had the usual stresses in life. She went to the doctor and was told that stress was causing heartburn or reflux. She was treated with a medication that is appropriate for this problem.

Now, Judy is not a medication taking kind of person. She felt that she ate well and wasn’t any more stressed than she had been the last few years. “Why this symptom now?” Judy wondered. She tried the medicine. She took it for a few weeks and her symptoms did not improve. Judy, like the rest of us, went on the internet and looked up what the symptoms could be.

She went back to the doctor. The doctor wanted Judy to try another medication. She told her doctor that she really did not feel that her problem was reflux. She never had reflux and didn’t really know what it felt like, but she felt that something else was going on, so she would like to have some testing done. 

Fortunately, her doctor listened. Judy had a scope to look into her stomach. She was told that she had ulcers.

“Ok,” she said “weird, but okay.”

A week later, she got a call from the doctor to come in to discuss the biopsy results.

“Biopsy?” Judy didn’t even know that they had done a biopsy.

The doctor wanted her to come that day, Judy said she had to work so would need to come another day. The doctor told her that she needed to come that day.

I’d be scared, and she was too.

Judy changed her schedule and went to the appointment where the doctor told her that the biopsy showed stomach cancer. Imagine her shock! She told me that she listened to what the doctor said and was ready to get started with treatment. She told me that all she kept thinking was,

“I have to stay strong to get through this. How am I going to tell my family?”

Judy did not cry, but, her sister did when she told her. She did not tell her mother or her children. She told her husband, but did not feel supported or cared for. Judy went through the surgery and the chemotherapy; her children figured it out when her hair was falling out. Her mother never figured it out.

It is now 2 years later and she is doing well. She did ultimately tell her mother, after the treatment was done. 

What if Judy had not listened to her intuition? What if she had continued to take the reflux medicine? I can tell you that, if she had, by the time she had been diagnosed with the cancer, she would have had a much bigger problem, one that likely would not have had the potential to be cured. We do not know if this cancer will come back, but I do know that today, Judy looks great. She has one of the most positive attitudes that I have seen in a long time. I would never have guessed what she went through, had she not shared it with me.

The bottom line here is– listen to yourself. Tell your doctor your fears and your worries when you feel that something is not right with your body.

Speak up. You might be right. And if you are not, at least your worries can be calmed. 

Remember, it is up to you. Your health is your responsibility.