Barbara Primiani

Welcome to our CaringBridge website. We are using it to keep family and friends updated in one place. We appreciate your support and words of hope and encouragement. Thank you for visiting.


I have colorectal cancer.  Some people want to know all the details that led up to my diagnosis.  If you don't want to know all the ugly details, you should skip this part.  I will post updates in the journal section.


I was having some digestive issues for a couple months.  In my mind, I had a lot of plausible explanations, mostly stress related.  I finally discussed it with my family doctor, who thought it was irritable bowel.  We tried three different medications.  Obviously, none helped.  I went back to him in early December and asked if we were ready to move on from the IBS diagnosis.  He agreed and ordered a CT scan and referred me to a GI doc.  That was on a Monday.  I scheduled the CT scan for that Friday.  Tuesday was the last time I was able to eat.  Wednesday I started throwing up.  They were able to squeeze me in with a GI doc for Friday afternoon.  With a lot of prayers I was able to keep most of the contrast down for the CT scan.  When I went to the GI doctor, she told me the scan showed a mass in my colon that was obstructing my bowel.  


I was admitted to the hospital that evening and the next morning, Saturday,  had colostomy surgery.  On Monday they did a biopsy of the mass which turned out to be cancerous.