An Answer to Cancer

The incidence, prevalence, and severity of cancer is on the rise. All of us have had cancer in our family or circle of friends and co-workers. It is frightening. In some cases, when identified at an early stage it is highly treatable. The first question I ask is a particular cancer slow- or fast-growing. The great majority are slow-growing, which offers time for an integrated approach to be organized.

My beloved mother was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1978 at the age 58. I was already a practicing nutritionist. I met with her oncologist and suggested targeted nutritional support to help her heal her mastectomy and protect her from recurrence. I presented the oncologist with my cancer bible at that time — A Cancer Therapy: Results of Fifty Cases & The Cure of Advanced Cancer by Diet Therapy by Max Gerson, M.D.

The oncologist said that nutrition was not necessary. My mom followed the advice of her doctor, and not that of her holistically-oriented son. Two years later, her cancer came back in a metastasized (multi-site) state. Again, I presented evidence that nutrition and self-care practices enhanced medical treatment outcomes and minimized side effects. I was not advocating alternative cancer therapy, but integrative oncology, an approach that would come into being decades later. I was a harbinger of collaborative care. Her medical team once again discounted my suggestions. At this time, my mom started adding vegetable juices, chlorophyll, and vitamin C to her diet, but was too sick to eat well. Sadly, she passed away in 1981 at the age of 61, knowing that she was loved, but unable to love back, at least from this plane of existence.

This experience launched me on a campaign to find an answer to cancer, not the answer to cancer, not a war on cancer, but a peaceful way to co-exist with cancer and other illnesses of our modern age. As we know, there are a wide variety of cancers, and an even wider range of medical and natural treatment options. When a dear one has cancer, they most often opt for insurance-reimbursable approved medical treatment, such as surgery, chemotherapy, radiation, and hormone-blockers. New targeted medical treatments are available for those fortunate enough to qualify for them, such as immunotherapy.

Optimal Nutrition

In all cases, people with cancer need optimal nutrition to slow cancer progression, nourish the parts of the body that do not have cancer, and put cancer into regression. This process is like mulching weeds in a garden rather than using herbicides. Remission is a state where the disease is dormant, and the person is regaining the well-being that the illness and treatment were sapping. My answer to cancer is to support whole person health in the midst of cancer treatment, be it aggressive or moderate conventional treatment, or a watchful waiting. With proper guidance a person with cancer can do more than kill fast growing cells, but assess and address impaired detoxification, hormone imbalances, and inborn or acquired errors of metabolism that lead to an up-regulated expression cancer promoting genes.

An answer to cancer is to focus on improving epigenetics. Epigenetics is the study of heritable changes in gene expression that occur without alterations to the underlying DNA sequence. It’s about how factors like our diet, environment and behaviors can influence how our genes are expressed, turning them “on” or “off”. These changes can affect various aspects of our health and development. I teach people with cancer how to improve the way they eat, move, meditate, relate, serve, and love themselves. All of these factors influence how their body responds to treatment and opens them up to receiving healing energy from the life force of the universe. My answer to cancer it to inform people that cancer is a dramatic wake-up call to activate their self-healing capacities, whether they are undergoing chemotherapy, have eschewed it, found it too toxic and debilitating to continue, or completed as much conventional treatment as their body can bear.

Living Well

My answer to cancer is to remind people that they can live well with cancer. The goal is for them to build health in the midst of illness. The body/mind/spirit responds beautifully to enhanced nutrition and affirmative prayer. One of my early questions is if people have Faith, and to tell me about this. On people in the Blue Zone regions of the world who live well past the age of 100, 90% have a strong religious practice with great Faith. People who say YES! to life and are open to the infinite energy of Source to be with them, show remarkable durability. I emphasize Food and Faith as an answer to cancer. Faith can be in a Supreme Being or be non-specific. It can be love, nature, compassion, belief in an afterlife — or all of the above.

My answer to cancer is for people to live as well as they can for as long as they can, one day at a time. I have witnessed miracles that to me are not miracles, but rather timely application of the laws of nature, spirit, and healing. My joy is helping people understand what they can do to build their health and slow their disease progression. Of course, when there is pain, suffering, nausea, diarrhea, neuropathy, anemia, and various conditions that accompany both disease and treatment, my job it to share natural remedies to manage these discomfort and complement prescribed pharmaceutical medicine. Very often, a person has so many drugs that they lose their appetite and have a hard time taking in good food, herbs, and nutrients.

Integrative Oncology

I always reach out to their medical team to introduce the idea of integrative oncology, wherein each of us do what we do best. The doctors provide medical treatment, I provide expert person-centered nutrition, social workers, physical, and occupational therapists, and chaplains, all work together with mutual respect. I am happy to say that today, unlike in the time when my mother was treated for cancer, and failed to live through it, many oncologists welcome my input. In teaching how to build health rather than kill disease, clients realize that cancer is not an immediate death sentence, but rather a call to action to wake up and live with purpose, a solid recovery plan that they can manage. It’s self-care practiced with love that propels healing in addition to targeted treatment.

An answer to cancer is to create wellness and sustain a wellness community for people in process, which is all of us allowing fresh, lively energy to emerge.

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