A 37-year-old Long Island dad of three was benching 302 pounds and keeping in great health when he got the sudden diagnosis that rocked him to his core in October: “aggressive” colon cancer.
It was the same disease that ended up recently killing one of his favorite actors, “Dawson’s Creek’’ James Van Der Beek.
“It was very, very difficult when my doctor told me, ‘You have a blockage,’ ” Patchogue handyman Travis Travieso recently recalled to The Post.
The dad didn’t know it at the time, but he was becoming part of a terrifying growing statistic that is currently baffling doctors.
Scans showed that Travieso had a 7.3-centimeter tumor covering 90% of his colon.
“Everything just happened so fast after that,” he said.
Northwell Health doctors surgically removed his aggressive stage 2 tumor days after its discovery. But that was still only the beginning of Travieso’s worst nightmare.
He was given weeks of aggressive post-operation chemotherapy because of his relatively young age and because his cancer took such a powerful form, according to his surgeon, Dr. David Rivadeneira of Huntington Hospital.
“The surgery was the easy part,” Travieso said. “The hard part is going through the chemo. … You’re not just fighting cancer, you’re fighting those side effects.”
The extreme fatigue, nausea, weakness and hard conversations with his three little ones brought down the once-strong man, he said.
“It gets actually tougher, because you get weaker as you go,” he said, noting he had to spend Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s getting chemo.
Finally, on Feb 12, Travieso finished his sixth and final round of chemotherapy and was declared cancer-free.
“It means a lot. It means happiness. I beat it,” he said.
“I actually won.”
A warning to young people
Travieso is now looking to spread the word, especially among millennials, that colon cancer is no senior-citizen disease.
“People my age, just get checked,” he said. “Don’t assume it’s something else.”
He said he was gutted when Van Der Beek, a married dad of six, succumbed to stage 3 colon cancer at age 48 last week.
“Seeing that he had the same sickness, disease that I have, it just broke my heart,” Travieso said.
And many more young people are at risk, according to Rivadeneira.
“We are seeing a significant increase in the last decade — it’s about a 200 to 300% increase in colon and rectal cancer in patients less than 50,” the doctor said.
Rivadeneira said such cancer was hardly present among young people when he began training 30 years ago, but that situation has long since changed.
“I see 30-year-olds, I see 40-year-olds every day with colorectal cancer. I even saw a 21-year-old recently with colon cancer,” he said.
The most frightening part is that “we really don’t know” what is behind the worrisome trend, the doc said.
“It’s probably a combination of multiple things,” he said, adding that poor diet, obesity, smoking, and family history are likely contributing factors.
But as in Travieso’s case, the signs can be extremely hard to spot and may be barely present.
Traviesoo only opted for a screening after noticing blood in his stool, which he first dismissed as a result of eating something spicy on vacation.
“Prior to that, I didn’t feel anything,” the dad said. “I felt strong, normal.”
Rivadeneira said that getting a colonoscopy is still the “gold standard” for screening, which is recommended starting at 45 but may also be worthwhile for those much younger.
“If you’re 32 years old and you’re having changes in bowel habits and you see blood and you’re having issues, see a doctor, get evaluated, and it wouldn’t be surprising that we would recommend a colonoscopy,” the doctor said.
The positive side is that Rivadeneira said “it’s a very curable cancer,” especially when caught early, and oftentimes, a straightforward surgery such as the one Travieso had suffices without chemo to follow.
“It’s minimally invasive — smaller incisions, what we term keyhole surgery,” the doctor said.
“Most people stay in the hospital one or two days, full recovery within two to three weeks.”