1. Persistent Bloating
Sarah first noticed her stomach seemed a little puffier than usual. “I chalked it up to my period, or maybe stress eating,” she recalled. “But it lasted for weeks, and none of my usual tricks—cutting salt, drinking more water—made it go away.”
Bloating is often dismissed as minor digestive discomfort, but for women, it can be an early symptom of ovarian, colon, or other abdominal cancers. “Looking back, my jeans were tighter, my stomach felt tight. I should’ve said something,” Sarah admitted.
2. Unexplained Lower Back Pain
She also began to experience a dull ache in her lower back. “It wasn’t sharp or unbearable—it just lingered,” she said. As someone who sat at a desk all day, Sarah assumed it was posture-related. “I bought a new chair. I did stretches. I thought I was being proactive.”
But back pain, especially when persistent and not relieved by usual remedies, can sometimes signal cancer that’s spread to the bones or other organs.
3. Extreme Fatigue
The final symptom was the hardest to pin down: exhaustion. “I was sleeping eight hours and still waking up tired,” she explained. “At one point, I stopped going to the gym because I just couldn’t push through it anymore.”
Sarah attributed it to burnout—but bloodwork later revealed she was severely anemic, a common sign of internal bleeding or advanced illness.
It wasn’t until a routine physical, where her doctor noted her low iron and a concerning lump near her abdomen, that she was sent for scans. The diagnosis: stage 4 metastatic cancer. The exact origin is still being studied, but it had already spread to her liver and lymph nodes.
Now undergoing aggressive treatment, Sarah is using her platform to spread awareness. “I’m not sharing this for pity,” she said in another video. “I’m sharing it because I don’t want anyone else to ignore their body like I did.”
Doctors agree that young adults often delay seeking care, assuming they’re too young for serious illness. “If something feels wrong for more than two weeks, get it checked,” Sarah urged. “Even if you’re scared. Especially if you’re scared.”
