Omaha has been spoiled here with warmer than usual winter weather, but last week's weather reminded me that the cold is not ever far away. It was sub-zero wind chill two days when I left the house to go to work, and even with wrapping myself up and wearing a hat all day, the head pounded. I am glad the weekend did not involve leaving the house, and today was much warmer, so I should face Monday with less pain. It gets hard to concentrate, and since my head holds my greatest tool for work as a medical librarian, this is a coping issue.
I want to thank all of those who share their stories about having ACC and continuing their lives while facing the stress of living with cancer. I feel that we "get each other"whenever we email or comment, knowing without having to say it out loud what life is like now that we know we are mortal and are paying the bills that proved it to us. I have lost a few of the people that shared this change of perspective, and I really miss them. I value greatly the others that I email with - and just wanted to say thank you in public.
If anyone has some advice on how a person can keep on keeping on, I would eagerly share it here with others. Drop me a note, please.
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Hi Teri, this is Adam Spady. Thank you for the nice post on my caringbridge site the other day, I appreciate it:) I believe you had posted on my site last yr, but I think I was down in Mexico at the time doing treatments and I forgot to reply to your post when I got home. Anyhow, I didn't read your whole blog but I was just curious what type of radiation you had? And I think I saw you had surgery initially? Any chemo? I was just curious b/c I'm doing alt treatments now through a hospital in Tijuana, Mexico called Oasis of Hope after going through the whole cut/burn/poison i.e. surgery/radiation/chemo here in the US.
Initially, I had fast-neutron radiation (the most nasty type there is I believe) back in 1996. Then I was in remission for almost 9 yrs and thought I was home-free until it came back w/a vengeance (as they say it often does) in '05. At that time I had surgery in Dec, followed by 3 months of chemo/radiation (3 types of chemo & standard radiation not the "neutron bomb" again) in early '06. Then it spread to my lungs (probably caused by either the surgery and/or chemo) and I had the right middle lobe removed in '07. 2008 marked the beginning of reconstructive surgeries to repair the damage caused by all the horrible treatments, which consisted of about 6 months of multiple surgeries (w/breaks in between to let me heal). Then in '09 I found out the cancer was in my liver (again probably spread by either surgery and/or chemo).
A couple yrs prior to that I had decided that never again could I or would I put my self through those horrific treatments. Then fortunately I came across Oasis of Hope through personal research online (www.oasisofhope.com) and ordered their free book. After reading it, I decided that would be the place I'd go if my cancer ever came back...and that's just what I did shortly after I found out it had spread to my liver, beginning treatments there in the fall of '09. The nice thing about these alt treatments is there are NO side effects (at least I've never had any)and you can do them in the comfort of your own home (for the most part), as it basically amounts to taking a bunch of pills (vit/min/nutrients) everyday and going back only a couple times a yr for maintenance boosters (the things you can't do at home, like massive IV doses of Vit B-17, Vit C, Vit K, Ozone Therapy, etc). My cancer is stable for the most part, it's still there but not at all very active and I've been living w/it as such for the past 2+ yrs. Oasis views cancer as a chronic disease and they try managing it w/all the vit/min supp (allowing your body do what it was designed to do, naturally heal itself) instead of blasting it out of you like they do here in the US, w/no regard for the permanent damage caused to your body by the treatments. The first 2 guiding principle at Oasis are "love the patient as yourself" & "do no harm to the patient". Now I really hope & pray your cancer never comes back, but unfortunately the odds are not exactly in our favor (as I've come to find out) esp in this toxic world that we live in. So if you would ever like to know more about the treatments at Oasis, I'd be more than happy to answer any ?'s you might have about them:)
Oasis truly is LIGHT YEARS ahead of the way they treat cancer in this country, but sadly money, politics, corruption, greed, deception, etc dictate the types of treatments that are made available to us here in the US (see the books "Cancer - Step Outside the Box" & "World Without Cancer - The Story of Vitamin B-17"). After learning of this, it used to make me so angry and while it still isn't right, I'm at peace now knowing that God will "...bring to ruin those ruining the earth" as it states in Rev 11:18. The people responsible for these corrupt & dishonest practices may not be polluting or physically harming the earth itself, but they are harming the people which I'd like to think are the most important part of the earth in God's eyes...
Take Care
Adam Spady
P.S. Teri is my Mom's name:)
Thank you so much for your comments, Adam, and I am very happy to hear that you are finding the treatments beneficial at keeping the ACC stable. May I have your permission to elevate your first comment to a post? I would like folks to read more about your treatment path.
Hi Teri, yes certainly that would be great if you elevated my comment to a post! I'm in the process of writing a book about my journey as well:) Actually I'd like you to elevate both comments if you would b/c I think it's vital that people know about and read those 2 books I mentioned. Many people have NO IDEA the politics involved in cancer, as I certainly didn't either, but those 2 books (there are others too) REALLY opened my eyes to the sad reality of the dishonest/corrupt/greedy world we live in. I don't mean to sound negative, but rather just realistic unfortunately. Many people associate the word quackery w/alt cancer treatments like laetrile (i.e. Vit B-17), but it's time people knew the TRUTH.
Thank you
Adam
Teri--let me think about this one, the question of how we keep on keeping on.
Even though I've kept myself alive for 13 years with breast cancer and then metastatic disease (10 years now with mets), I'm not sure I can explain coherently.
Maybe I'll post the question on my blog and direct readers to your post so that they can give you their thoughts--is that OK?
Jeanne
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