I'm 28. I've had IBS for my whole life -- it was relatively mild until about a year or so ago when stress / anxiety / etc. (and who knows what else) caused it to get noticeably worse. Before this, it didn't interfere too much with my life ... I could still hang out with friends or go play outdoors or eat out without worrying. Now since things have changed, I can't do much of anything. I wake up each day not knowing whether I'll be having constipation / discomfort problems that day, or whether it will be a day of bathroom trip after bathroom trip.The diet that works for my IBS one day upsets it the next. The things I take for constipation then cause diarrhea and vice versa and I can't get things evened out.I had to take a lot of antibiotics around Christmas for a UTI that wouldn't go away, and developed what my GP and my GI thought was C Diff. Was on Flagyl and then Vanco, neither of which helped the horrible diarrhea, so they decided it would be best to do an upper endoscopy and a colonoscopy to check to see if I had some form of IBD.No Crohn's, no colitis, no C Diff, no UC ..... just a polyp. Unfortunately the polyp was an adenoma, but a "low risk" one.A big deal was made about how I'm "too young" to be having a colon polyp.That didn't help the situation because I also suffer from health anxiety (my dad went out to run one night, was perfectly healthy, and died of sudden cardiac arrest at 50 ... my grandmother thought she had the flu for two days, went to the doctor, diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, almost immediately had a stroke and died soon after .... my mom got dizzy after surgery once, turned out to be a pulmonary embolism but thank God she's still alive and well) .... anyway. Health anxiety rules my life much more than I'd like.So here I have IBS that rules my life, some lasting apprehension about having had a polyp at "such a young age", and several other issues.Lately my back had been hurting, so my urologist sent me for a CT to make sure everything was okay with my kidneys.Everything with my kidneys was fine.However, the report mentioned a large ovarian cyst (fine, I've had them before) and DIVERTICULA.This after just having had a colonoscopy in January! So I read all I could on the internet about diverticulosis and diverticulitis and, as someone with health anxiety, that turned out to be a horrible idea because all I could focus on were the horror stories and the fact that I do have a bit of pain in my lower left quadrant which could be the IBS, the ovarian cyst, or the diverticula.Again, the nurse made a huge deal about how I'm "too young" for diverticulosis, and how I should be very concerned. THANKS, lady. :\Finally got in to see my GI this week and he did his best to reassure me that my diverticulosis shouldn't cause any problems because they were small enough that they couldn't even be seen during the colonoscopy. He tried his best to reassure me about eating seeds and nuts. He tried his best to reassure me that even if I DO ever develop diverticulitis that it can almost always be treated easily.But I'm here now just kind of discouraged and hopeless feeling. The internet says that when young people have diverticulosis, it tends to be aggressive. That surgery is usually necessary. ...I guess I'm kind of feeling alone, lost, scared, defeated, terrified. I'm in the midst of trying (for the past year) to find an antidepressant that will work, but so far my anxiety and depression have been treatment resistant.I'm just scared that all of these things mean I'm doomed to some catastrophic event in the future. I notice every tiny feeling in my lower left quadrant (where the diverticulosis is) and each sensation has me starting to prepare for the worst ... or has me fearing that I already have an infection. This is a long post, I know, and maybe no one will get all the way through it - that's okay. I just wanted to write it because I didn't know if maybe anyone else could understand feeling so discouraged with all of these GI issues that we have. How do you continue to function and not let it ruin / rule your thoughts and your activities?