Introduction Your surgical oncologist said the words 'stool bag,' and suddenly that was all you could hear. That jolt of fear hits before you have even absorbed the cancer diagnosis. A stoma, an opening on the abdominal wall that diverts feces into an external pouch, feels like a theft of normalcy. It stirs deep anxieties about control and how you see your own body. The good news is straightforward: a stoma is not the default outcome. Modern colorectal oncology has moved far