A woman spent three years being misdiagnosed and was incorrectly sent to an eating disorder clinic, with doctors dismissing her Crohn’s disease symptoms as psychological.
Medical professionals even mistakenly suggested that Lucy Dare, 21, was suffering from food poisoning, despite the fact she was actually vomiting fecal matter due to a life-threatening perforated bowel.
Lucy first encountered symptoms such as rectal bleeding, severe abdominal pain, weight loss, and fatigue at the age of 12, causing her to miss out on crucial years of her childhood.
She frequently visited the bathroom up to 15 times daily and struggled with eating, all the while unaware, along with her doctors, of the underlying issue.
Crohn’s disease is a persistent inflammatory bowel disease that currently lacks a cure. It leads to recurring symptom flare-ups, including diarrhea, abdominal pain, anal discomfort, weight loss, and the presence of blood or mucus in stools.
Lucy’s condition remained unidentified for years. She missed two years of schooling and couldn’t take her GCSEs because her symptoms made her anxious about leaving the house, using the school bathroom, and dealing with severe abdominal pain and eating difficulties.
At age 13, Lucy’s weight dropped to just 38kg. Combined with symptoms like an urgent need to use the bathroom post-meals, medical professionals assumed she was suffering from anorexia or bulimia.
She was sent for treatment at an eating disorder facility near her North London home, but her symptoms persisted.
Eventually, Lucy underwent an endoscopy and colonoscopy to investigate the possibility of a physical condition and was diagnosed with Crohn’s disease in 2019.
Although she finally received the diagnosis she needed, Lucy’s journey was far from over as she faced multiple challenges thereafter.
During one severe episode, Lucy suffered from a perforated bowel that required life-saving surgery. She continues to struggle with finding effective medication and frequently visits the emergency room due to ongoing chronic pain and digestive issues.
This bowel perforation resulted in her vomiting fecal matter.
Recalling the frightening night she fell gravely ill, Lucy described being at a friend’s house when she started experiencing severe abdominal pain.
“I rushed to the toilet. I was just going to the toilet and vomiting non-stop, just really coming out. I couldn’t walk or anything,” she said.
“My mom had to come over to my friend’s house, pick me up and bring me down the stairs to go to A&E.”
During her initial two days in the hospital, Lucy was informed that her illness might be psychological. However, her mother, Leza, insisted on a CT scan amid fears of a perforated bowel. It was later revealed that her brown vomit contained fecal matter.
Leza’s persistence paid off, and the scan confirmed that Lucy had a perforated bowel, a life-threatening condition where a hole forms in the intestine, allowing intestinal contents to leak into the abdomen. Lucy was rushed into emergency surgery and had a stoma bag fitted.
Now, six years after her diagnosis, Lucy and her mother aim to raise awareness about Crohn’s disease.
Leza explained: “We hadn’t even heard of Crohn’s before Lucy. A lot of people, a lot of girls, especially, I think they get misdiagnosed with eating disorders. And it’s wrong.
“Obviously periods as well, they put a lot of things down to that and body image, [being told] it’s in your head.
“And then you get left, and then it gets worse.”