My Great Breast Cancer Adventure

A Memoir about Breast Cancer? Or...not? Some Ramblings...

from a June 7, 2011 "daily write":

I wish I had a solid idea for a memoir, because the idea of writing a memoir so appeals to me. I am reading one now, on my Kindle, I forget the title. Lazy me. Okay, wait a minute. I'll go find my kindle. Hang on.

Imperfect Endings, by Zoe Fitzgerald Carter.

It's a grown 42-year-old daughter talking about the experience of being unhappily involved in her ailing mother's desire to commit assisted suicide. The book is less than 300 pages long. The writing is good but not stunning. The topic is manageable. A good topic for a memoir, set within a reasonable frame of time. 

My problem would be that I would try to include everything under the sun in any memoir I might attempt to do. I am unable to see any story but The Whole Story Up To This Point. I would go nuts mixing up all my old lovers with all my pancreatic enzymes. One minute you'd be reading about Jim's mechanical flying vulvas, the next you'd be lying with me on my expensive new infrared Bio-Mat, set to 160 cancer-killing degrees, sweating like a pig and wondering how many more minutes you had to go. Another minute you'd be hearing about how my Dad once dressed up as a hobo (bag tied onto end of stick) and let me take pictures of him out in our backyard in Brigham City, Utah, for my school paper on hobos, the next minute you'd be agonizing along with me over the pros and cons of having my left breast cut off.

Sleep and Health, Rest and Health, Less Stress and Health

More Sleep and Rest, Less Stress ='s Better Health. Duh.

Less blogging can lead to more rest, less pressure to say it all and to say it right.

Blogging can be a good release, yes. Therapeutic, even. Healing. But not always. Sometimes one needs to go inward ((particularly if one is a writer), to move away from the urge to always be communicating verbally...sharing, disseminating information, sorting and organizing thoughts and feelings, making one's life an open book, telling one's most intimate stories.

That's how I've been feeling lately. I want to be alone more -- quiet, simple, calm, unfettered by blog demands.

Plus: my laptop is in the shop again, so I am writing on an old clunker backup that makes the process twice as long.

So. I am not posting much right now. Taking a little break. I will be back full throttle after this break (or maybe I should call it a slow-down rather than a break).

Later...

 

Update?

An email today from my sister Jill:

I tried so hard not to do this, but holding your breath for almost a week is not easy!!!!  I know you are busy, but I hope that you will let us in on the next phase of your journey to Eileen Poole's office!  Also, hoping that "no news is good news" applies in this case?
 
Hope you are holding up okay.  If I don't hear back, that's okay, too.....I'll just take another breath.
 
xoxo
 
Jill

My response:

Just extremely busy with work -- taxes, registrations for next session, marketing for next session, medical bureaucracy, bills, doctor check-ins re: the endlessly ongoing shingles, health insurance forms, obstacles to getting going on new treatments (ie. can't find a compounding pharmacy to make the Arimidex cream and can't get through to Renneker until April 2nd to ask him for help with this)...all the usual stuff, but done slower because of the shingles battle plus just the general tiredness that comes after surgery, even though it has been, I realize with shock, almost two months now.

I can't imagine how I'd be dealing with all this without JK, who is STILL helping me four-six hours a week. I need more like ten to twelve hours a week of help, really, and I'm working toward getting a "real" paid assistant to take JK's place, which is why I am also working on trying to create two more classes that I will teach, myself, every session (oh joy)...but if I can do that and get enough students, I'd rather be teaching and using that extra income to pay an assistant (and hoping that I will at least make more $$ from the extra teaching load than what I will need in order to pay the assistant). JK is helping me work toward this goal. Maybe I will also try to get something going with unpaid interns, in order to actually get 10 to 12 hours a week. But all of this takes time and effort to set up...and to then oversee, in the case of interns (so I am not sure this would be worth the trouble...but maybe...).

So...blogging is a luxury right now. I am buried under the workload. But thanks for caring/checking.

j.

Paths to Healing: "There are More Things in Heaven and Earth than are Ever Dreamt Of..."

Excerpt from the dustcover book flap of the book Extraordinary Knowing, by Elizabeth Lloyd Mayer, Ph.D.:

"Hunches, intuition, premonitions, gut instinct -- we've all had the experience of knowing something that we couldn't possibly know. We often shrug it off as coincidence, but is it something more? Where does such knowledge come from? Can these experiences be rationally explained?"

Excerpt from the foreward by Freeman Dyson:

"There are three possible positions that one may take concerning the evidence for ESP. First, the position of orthodox scientists, who believe that ESP does not exist. Second, the position of true believers, who believe that ESP is real and can be proved to exist by scientific methods. Third, my own position, that ESP is real, as the anecdotal evidence suggests, but cannot be tested with the clumsy tools of science. These positions also imply different views concerning the proper scope of science. If one believes, as many of my scientific colleagues believe, that the scope of science is unlimited, the science can ultimately explain everything in the universe, and ESP must either be non-existent or scientifically explainable. If one believes, as I do, that ESP exists but is scientifically untestable, one must believe that the scope of science is limited. I put forward, as a working hypothesis, that ESP is real but belongs to a mental universe that is too fluid and evanescent to fit within the rigid protocols of controlled scientific testing. I do not claim that this hypothesis is true. I claim only that it is consistent with the evidence and worthy of consideration."

Excerpt from the foreward by Carol Gilligan:

"Once we open the door to mind-matter anomalies, who knows what the rules are? . . . Can minds touch each other in ways that transcend [the boundaries of] mind and space as we understand them? . . . What if the perceptions we now label extra-sensory . . . could be reliably trained to deepen people's ordinary knowing of each other, extending our capacities for empathy and compassion? . . . What if we took possibilities like that seriously — seriously enough to subject them to our best scientific scrutiny?

Excerpt from Chapter 3 of Extraordinary Knowing:

Most of us recognize what it's like to disavow some piece of knowing that feels rationally indefensible, whether or not we've ever come close to an apparently anomalous experience. I began to think about how these disavowals fall along a spectrum. At one end of that spectrum lies our refusal to go public with any mildly unusual experiences until they've been translated into the appearance of logic. At the far end comes our disavowal of events as apparently weird and extraordinary [as that neurosurgeons' white light] . . . (Me: You'll have to read the book to get this story about the neurosurgeon.)

. . . Maybe, regardless of where along the spectrum our personal disavowals happen to fall, examining what they have in common can help us grapple with the extraordinary knowings at the far end, those that trouble us the most."

The Great Mysteries: Pot and Bieler's Broth and Eileen Poole and My Own Brain, etc.

Okay, I just added videos #2 and #3 to yesterday's post. Now back to Eileen and Bieler's Broth.

I wrote back to Robyn and said I'd like to take the 10 a.m. Monday appointment (last Monday, March 8th). She wrote back and said fine.

For the next few days prior to the appointment, I started asking myself why I had made the appointment, because it cost MONEY, and didn't I have about ten million other more pressing expenses that I should have used that money for? What could I have been thinking? I didn't even know what Eileen was going to do . . . sit me down and say: "Eat your vegetables, drink plenty of Bieler's Broth, and you'll be fine."? Was I really going to see some kind of semi-psychic nutritional advisor? Was I deranged? Bonkers? Huh? 

But I couldn't bring myself to cancel, so instead I worked hard at coming up with rational reasons that would make it okay, even though my original "reasons" had nothing to do with rationality or logic. In fact, I hadn't even based my decision on any solid reasons, only on hazy intuitive feelings.

I managed to come up with a mental list of "reasons" that sort of validated my decision, but it didn't totally work. I still felt doubtful, and I thought: "Well, I'm not going to blog about this because if I do I'll come off sounding like a woo-woo nutcase. It'll make me look like a quackery victim, a space cadet. I'll just sneak over there, have a disappointing appointment that makes me feel like a gullible fool, then go home to quietly bemoan my episode of temporary insanity."

A couple of days before my appointment I did a couple more mental flip-flops and said to myself: "Oh for heaven's sake, Jane. Stop trying to make sense of everything all the time. Allow for the possibility that sometimes it can work to go by hunches. What about that Great Mystery you regularly pray to? What about that, huh? Remember mystery? You respect mystery, right? Right. So just let your decision to go see Eileen Poole be a mystery, and even if it seems dorky and useless when you get there, EVEN THEN it may be useful or meaningful in some way that you will come to understand later. Have faith, Jane."

This woo woo train of thought led me to take a bath, and on the way to the tub I grabbed a book I read two or three years ago called Extraordinary Knowing. I remembered that I had enjoyed it but nothing more specific. I figured I'd soak in my oatmeal bath (to try and sooth my shingle-fiery skin) and read about something other than nutrition or cancer.

To be continued...

Prayer Time First

Photo: In My Cerebral Garden

Sheesh, my first inclination upon waking was to leap into finishing yesterday's Round Robin task of copying and pasting 32 students' "Allow Me to Introduce Myself" writes from their emails into our class blog.

No, Jane. First (or at least after you make that "compromise cup"  of very weak coffee and wash that sink full of yesterday's dirty dishes), how about let's start the day with the mantra prayer that you have been saying off and on for the last couple of weeks whenever you are feeling especially frightened...or even especially brave:

Oh Great Mystery, Divine Life Force of my being, unto the Father and Mother within come forward this moment, this hour, and walk in front of me, and help me do the right thing, help me say the right thing, help me stay on the path that is right for me in all that I do and am this day. In kindness and in love, so be it.

Time for Another Breast Cancer Post - Great Article

Research Helps Breast Cancer Patients Arm Themselves before Visiting Oncologists

by Barbara Minton, Natural Health Editor

See all articles by this author

(NaturalNews) After a diagnosis of breast cancer, most women want to know where they fit into the statistics being quoted to them as reasons for submitting to the traditional toxic treatments being advocated by their oncologists. Scientists in China are helping to further this understanding through research revealing a statistical breakdown of which forms of breast cancer are the most deadly, and which may not be so dangerous. Any woman being pressured to accept chemotherapy, radiation, and follow-drugs can use these statistics to empower herself and more accurately assess where she stands.

In the study, the clinical-pathological characteristics of triple negative breast cancer were investigated.. This type of cancer is diagnosed when cells in the breast lack all three receptors: estrogen receptors, progesterone receptors and human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER-2).

Although these receptors can help fuel breast cancer growth in some cases, they are also indicative of less threatening cancers. Cells that are able to express these factors more closely resemble normal cells, while cells that cannot express the factors have lost resemblance to normal cells. When cancerous cells more closely resemble normal cells, they are more easily returned to a state of normalcy. The lack of receptors makes triple negative breast cancer one of the most deadly forms of cancer.

Click HERE to read the rest of this highly informative and useful article

More Misleading Journalism Articles about "Progress" in Breast Cancer Treatments

From another alternative health email newsletter that I subscribe to, from Dr. Isaac Eliaz (his website is HERE):

Just a couple of days ago, I stumbled across a truly infuriating story in The New York Times. The headline?

“Promising Results in Stomach and Breast Cancer Drugs”

Now, considering the fact that a large portion of my career has been devoted to the search for effective cancer therapies, you might find my frustration just a little confusing. After all, it goes without saying that any progress in the fight against cancer—however small—is incredibly good news that’s worth celebrating.

So why am I so frustrated by this latest story?

Radiation and Breast Cancer

Last night I fell asleep listening to a free audio podcast of a "New Dimensions" interview with Mitchell Mays, the man who created the "superfood" green powder, Pure Synergy (which I have mentioned in other, recent posts) that I now take religiously every day.

Maybe something about that interview made me wake up and, first thing, go to this blog to add a "special page" to the sidebar. It's a link to an article, "Revisiting Accepted Wisdom in the Management of Breast Cancer," that I first posted back in November of 2005, and that I'm sure I posted again later. But unless you go trawling back through all my archives (has ANYONE ever done that, I wonder? Ha! Unlikely....but if even one person has, and it has helped them, I feel my efforts have been worthwhile), you're not gonna see it.

So. . . I realized that it should be prominently displayed in the sidebar, not buried in the archives.

I also somehow (?), as I was sipping my coffee, came upon this article: "Radiation Causes Breast Cancer."

It's not a scientific study, so I don't automatically accept any of the statistics or percentages given, even though my bias is indeed against radiation. However, even without delving into an attempt to verify the validity of the stated stats, I think there's still a lot of useful food for thought, here.

This particular portion of the article made me angry and, yes, added to my stockpile of fears that I will die from breast cancer mets someday:

"....Both radiation and chemical toxins are implicated, but while some are "initiators" of cancer, and others are "promoters," radiation is both. That means it facilitates cancer easily. Yet only two pages in the 78-page report are about radiation, mainly from X-rays and other medical treatments.

"It's not to say you shouldn't have X-rays, but let's treat them the way we treat prescription drugs," says Evans, "put the dosage in the record, instead of telling the patient that having an X-ray is like flying to Denver." One would need to fly 3,300 hours to receive the equivalent of one chest X-ray. Even a mammogram, the smallest dosage, is equivalent to 1000 hours of flying."

My anger stems from the fact that, back when I thought I was on the road to chemo, I had to schedule a surgery to have my "porta-cath" inserted above my left breast (a contraption through which you can receive your chemo, thus eliminating the need to have it shot it into your arm veins). Prior to the surgery, I had to have a chest x-ray. At that point, I hadn't yet figured out that I had other options or that I could question anything. 

Wow, that one x-ray, which ended up being all for nothing, was a huge dose of radiation. Someone should have told me that this amount of radiation wasn't "negligible."

Of course, I will continue to do all I can to reshape this addition to my "fears-stockpile" into something more constructive.

In fact, it's 8 a.m., time for my first glass of Pure Synergy. 

Why I Like "Real" WHOLE Milk, Cheese and Yogurt & Think It Helps Me Stay Healthy

Read This

And This

Oprah, Suzanne, Women's Rights & Mortgage Squatters

Oprah: If you missed Oprah's recent shows on HRT - the most recent being an interview with Suzanne Somers and a couple of doctors, yesterday — I'm sure you can go to her website and play some interesting catch-up. I think she's got some Internet Q & A sessions going, too.

And make no mistake, Suzanne Somers is not the ditzy, dumb-blonde character she played on that sitcom, Three's Company, or was it Three's a Crowd?, oh so many years ago. Anyway...she's one smart cookie. Savvy, intelligent, resourceful, practical, and not afraid to get out there and stand up to one "authority" after another, holding her ground and fending off bullshit flack from conservative medical establishment people who pronounce that because she's not a doctor or scientist, she doesn't know what she's talking about. What a load of crap. She has educated herself very well, she has just written her third or fourth health-related book, and she knows plenty.

Equal Pay for Women (the new bill that Obama just signed): Fantastic, of course, but when I excitedly brought it up at my writing group last night, someone said, "Hold it, hold it! This doesn't mean women are getting equal pay, it means they now have the right to SUE for equal pay."

Oh. Right. Of course. Silly me. Yeah, we've come a long way baby. Uh-huh.

Mortgage Squatters: A few minutes ago I caught a news segment featuring a woman Senator whose name I didn't catch, talking about how she's taking the lead in a movement that is urging every homeowner who has been foreclosed on to STAY PUT. She's furious about the Wall Street bailout fiasco, and is telling homeowners not to budge from the homes they are supposedly losing. Why the f....k, she says, should those a......holes get bailed out, but not you?

She's trying to help people learn how to get good legal representation from property lawyers who know the ropes because, she says, 99.9 percent of homeowners haven't got a clue how all this stuff works, how they could have been bamboozled, and how they can fight back, legally.

Sounds right to ME.

Finally, we are hearing some logical, straightfoward, common-sense talk coming from a few politicians. We're so accustomed to listening to nothing but double-talk gobbledygook, it's shocking to hear stuff that actually makes sense. Shocking when a few more people finally admit out loud that the emperor has no clothes, and the Wall Street CEOs are crooks beyond belief. CROOKS.

Oh, and as for the news commentators who bemoan Wall Street's "poor PR,"  I say, "Poor PR? Who cares about whether they have any PR savvy? The point is, they are corrupt, greedy, arrogant, immoral crooks. There's nothing complex about this. It's simple. It's glaringly obvious. Why can't more people see it and SAY it, loud and clear and without qualification?

............................................................................................

One more thing. Here's an email that just came to my Inbox:

Oprah Winfrey Continues BHRT Discussion

Dear Jane,

Yesterday, Jan. 29, dozens of women joined in the audience and on webcams for part two of the BHRT debate on “The Oprah Winfrey Show.”  Suzanne Somers, a long-time advocate for bioidentical hormone replacement therapy (BHRT), shared her story with the “Oprah” audience.

Robin McGraw, Dr. Phil’s wife and a BHRT patient, and Dr. Christiane Northrup, renowned author and speaker, started the conversation a couple weeks ago when they joined Oprah to talk about BHRT.  Women across the country wrote in to “The Oprah Show” wanting more information on how to take control of their menopause symptoms.

Somers shared her experience being treated by her physician with BHRT to alleviate her menopause symptoms.  She also demonstrated her daily regimen of compounded medications and dietary supplements. "By replacing my hormones with bioidentical hormones, I got my life back. I got my health back, I got my figure back, I got my happiness back," Somers said.

Oprah stressed that women “have the right to demand a better quality of life” and they should all do their research.

However, positive praise of BHRT was also met with harsh criticism when Dr. Lauren Streicher, an assistant professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Northwestern University and a practicing ob-gyn at Chicago's Northwestern Memorial Hospital, expressed her dislike for compounding pharmacies.

To be certain, Dr. Streicher’s commentary was the most grievous offense contained in the episode on compounding pharmacies.  She misstated facts and presented a distorted picture of pharmacy compounding and how the profession is regulated.  Today IACP sent a formal letter to the producers of “The Oprah Show” to dispel the untruths presented by Dr. Streicher.  

Hoping to clear up the confusion about compounding pharmacies, Dr. Mehmet Oz visited Central Pharmacy in Santa Monica, Calif., where he interviewed Sharon Steen, owner of the compounding pharmacy. Steen estimated that 90 percent of the medications her pharmacy compounds are BHRT. A pharmacist and technician demonstrated how a hormone cream is prepared.

At the end of the show, a taped segment featured a woman who shared her struggles with menopause on part one of the BHRT debate that aired Jan. 15. Robin McGraw escorted the woman to have her hormone levels checked. It was determine that she needed BHRT, and only nine days later she was noticing the difference. "The side effect from the bioidentical hormones is a big dose of joy. It's fantastic,” she told Oprah via webcam.

To view segments and read about what was discussed on the show, click here.

IACP Responds to Oprah
Today, the International Academy of Compounding Pharmacists (IACP) responded to “The Oprah Winfrey Show” with a formal letter correcting the misstatements made by Dr. Lauren Streicher on the show.

Click here to read IACP’s letter to Oprah Winfrey and her show producers.

We will keep you updated on further developments.

Sincerely,
P2C2

Valentine's Day Balm

My friend Ms. Toby sent this "unconditional love" link today, and I'm passing it on.