Cancer Holidays - Weeks 43, 44, 45 and 46 - Its been a year...

Its hard to believe but one year ago today I found out I had cancer. I'll never forget that day - sitting in the doctor's office by myself thinking there was nothing wrong with me like everyone had told me over the previous few months of exams and testing. And the look on my surgeon's face when she reviewed my file with me getting to the end where the pathology report was...So one year. A lot has happened in one short year - chemo, surgery, radiation, endless doctor appointments, cancer diets and good stuff too - engagement, birthdays, Christmas and another summer at the cottage. Hard to believe that's all been done in one year.


Like everyone, my summer feels like it has gone quickly but we just got back from two weeks at the cottage and Dom said it felt like we were gone a month - I agree, it did. We spent the first weekend of our holidays at Uncle Rick and Sharon's for the Fink summer get together - it was great to see everyone and while the group was smaller this year, I didn't mind because it gave us time to properly visit with each other. At the cottage Leanna, Trevor, Della and Maisie came up for a week and our friends Laurel and Brian joined us for a few days too. We spent the days hanging out on the dock, canoeing, boating, a bit of fishing, paddle boarding (or if you're Della doing gymnastics on the paddle board), doing a few day trips, rollerskating (that's right!) and just relaxing. I feel as though I've really tackled the fatigue hurdle - maybe I just needed some time away to relax.

Here are some of my favourite photos of our time at the cottage:

Wiarton Wednesdays when ice cream is only $1 a scoop!

 

Beachcombers!

 

Paddle boarding - and multi-use boarding

Dom's favourite soccer team (and now Maisie's too).

Rollerskating!

Rollerskating video (except Dom was the only one on roller blades which is why he looks like he's faster than everyone else - except for the expert roller skating couple that were the only other people there).

 Dom's cool birthday cake!

This is the best group shot I've got. 

Fat May and Lola loving the boat rides!

 Second last day - I spent the entire afternoon doing this (Lola too).

And this is how we spent one of our last nights at the cottage - only in Sauble Beach can a headliner of their Sand Fest be a Bon Jovi cover band - Bon Jovi Forever!

Now we're off to North Bay for the weekend to visit my cousin Carlie and Brian (its her 30th birthday today!) and next week I'm going to Bancroft to see some more of the Fink family at a cottage. I'm trying to make the most of the rest of the summer as I think I'll be back to work in September on a gradual basis, slowly working my way back to full time. I keep reminding myself that change is constant but progress is optional. I choose progress. For those people who don't figure this out through life they somehow don't appreciate their lives like others do and miss out on the lessons learned. 

So the cancer holidays are coming to an end I guess. Not that this cancer thing is over for me, I still have check ups at the doctor every three months (I've got one coming up in September actually) and I do still worry about cancer coming back and think about it frequently. I don't think that feeling will ever really go away - I think about it when I hear about other people newly diagnosed with cancer, when I see my own scars and weird things remind me in unexpected ways - like the other day I used some bath salts that I must've used while I was on chemo and for two days everytime I went into the bathroom I could smell the bath salts and it made me feel nauseous. Its amazing what the body and subconscious mind remember. 

I've got a friend who recently found out that her cancer has spread (metastasized) to other parts of her body, her name is Jaclyn - I've mentioned her in a previous post. I met her through the Facebook group that I'm part of and we're both from Southern Ontario and have a connection through one of my friends. Jaclyn was only a few months behind me in treatment - so her cancer holidays have now gotten an extension. Just goes to show you that cancer doesn't discriminate. I know she'll get through this, just like she got through her first round of treatment. Plus, she's got a great attitude and outlook towards life and I think that's the biggest lesson I've learned during this past year. It doesn't matter what happens in life, its how you deal with it. Attitude is everything. Accepting help and love from others is not far behind. So while you are reading this, send my friend Jaclyn some positive vibes - just say her name under your breath with a smile, she needs it right now.


My advice to all of you is be the reed in the wind - you might not think you are the strongest out there in the world but you are, if you don't break during the big storms - its better than being the oak tree who can handle the little breezes in life but when the big storm comes, down you go. Its a good lesson in life. 

 

I don't know if this will be my last post but it might be - we'll see. 

Thanks for joining me this past year, words cannot express my appreciation for the love, positive thoughts, emails, cards, food, phone calls, visits and of course cancer presents that I received this past year. A special thanks to Dom who stood by me through the barfing, hair loss and regrowth, fatigue, surgery drain (gross) and general bitchiness. I couldn't have a better partner. You made all the difference in the world to me and I'm glad you could join me on these holidays - although next time let's go to Barbados!

 

Cancer Holidays - Weeks 39, 40, 41 and 42 - I'm still kicking!

Yep, I'm still alive. Its been a month since my last post but the cancer holidays continue - I'll be off work for the remainder of the summer as I still have recovery to do - mostly with fatigue.  I'm good with everything else - as usual Tran has worked wonders and managed to get rid of my hot flashes and night sweats! So now its recovering from that fatigue - it creeps up on me when I least expect it - like today but oh well, nothing that a little R and R watching PVR'd Marilyn Denis episodes. 

Even though I'm not going to hospital as much I've been keeping quite busy with acpuncture, group therapy, massage, physio (I just started that because of scar tissue), check ups and general maintenance stuff - like a visit to the family doctor, eye doctor and a follow up with my neurosurgeon too. Turns out radiation can affect the blood vessels in your eyeballs - I didn't know this until I went in for a check up but don't worry, my eyeballs are fine - and so is every other part of my body that I've had checked out. Its weird - they don't do much follow up at the cancer centre after treatment - not even a simple blood test to make sure your body has bounced back after all of your treatments. Lucky for me, I've got a good family doctor and Dr. Craig also asked for a few blood tests (through my family doctor) to make sure all is well. 

I had another follow up appointment with Dr. Craig who told me that I have to increase my carb intake a bit since I'm going to gym so much and I've also got to work on cardio in addition to the weight training. FYI - cardio is the best at preventing chronic disease and strength training is the best at anti-aging. We talked a lot about nutrition and turns out Brazil's food guide is the best one in the world so if you want some light reading then check out this article on the food guide http://www.vox.com/2015/2/20/8076961/brazil-food-guide Its an interesting read and if you want a longer read, check out the actual food guide - Brazil Food Guide

I've also managed to keep busy by doing fun things like going to the cottage, visiting family including Nanny Knight (who at the age of 95, just had a cornea transplant), hanging out with Preety and other cancer friends as well as regular friends too! Oh and I had my first haircut! My hair got a lot darker after my haircut since the ends are lighter than the roots. Apparently chemo can not only give you curls but also can fade out your hair colour so I'm hoping it will continue to get darker. It grows like crazy too - its only been about a month since my haircut and its already quite a bit longer. I've decided I'm not going to get it cut again for the rest of the summer because I want my hair to be longer (not sure how long yet but longer than 2 inches) and I need to get past the awkward stage so hopefully I can do this before summer is up.

Group therapy is over - its hard to believe six weeks is up just like that - I found it helpful, sort of, but perhaps not as helpful as I hoped as I was put in the psychotherapy group which is basically group chatting about a specific topic (somewhat steered by the therapists). I've decided that the success of this technique relies a lot on who is in the group - not that the others in the group weren't nice people - they were great - but some of them were a bit too old for me to relate to them and everyone was at various stages - with me only a few months after treatment to another member who has had five years past since treatment. 
Anyways, it was still a worthwhile venture.   

We're off to the cottage for the last week of July and first week of August and I'm really looking forward to it. Laurel and Brian are coming up as well as Leanna and Trevor and their girls so its going to be fun. Last year I had cancer when we were on holidays but I didn't know it - so this year will be sort of a celebration. Its hard to think that its been a year already - a lot has happened in one short year.

So let's get back to the Eight Principles from that book Radical Remission that I have been explaining in my last few posts - remember these principles are what people did to get to remission - with or without conventional treatment:

Releasing Suppressed Emotions

So this is pretty straightforward - except sometimes its tough to figure out what your suppressed emotions are because, well, they are suppressed. But I think I figured it out by basically letting go of any bad thoughts/feelings about people - mainly from my past. I won't get into this too much since I didn't actively do this and of course don't want to throw some people under the bus - haha! 

Increasing Positive Emotions

This might seem easy but when you've got cancer, trust me, it can be tough. But its all about keeping tabs on the negative thoughts and staying on top of things. All in all though I found this pretty easy but I think it has to do with my general state of mind (which is good) and the fact that I have such fanstastic families and friends that really support me and also make me laugh.   

Deepening Your Spiritual Connection

This also might seem easy for you religious folk reading this but for people who aren't terribly religious, like myself, its sometimes difficult to get a handle on what this means or how to go about it. What it does mean, is that you do a great deal of thinking about what life means and how you are going to go about the rest of your life. Little annoying things don't matter as much to me - actually not at all - and good things are that much better. 

Cancer changes your perspective on things and makes you stop. Try this for a minute - just stop and think about things - your kids, partner, parents, friends and family - seriously take a few minutes and think about them. Now think about what you do every day and what you spend time on. Is it spending time with the people that are important to you? Doing the things that you love to do? Or is it time working, being stressed out about little things? Seriously just take that minute to stop and think. And this is a great segway to the next principle...

Having Strong Reasons for Living

This may seem obvious but I honestly think this is entirely reliant on how generally happy you are with life and how well you cope with a cancer diagnosis. Some people freak out and immediately think that they are going to die - I know this is true because people in my group therapy said so. I haven't had that feeling ever. That's right, not even once. Not that I'm not afraid of getting cancer again - I am. I know I am when I'm at the eye doctor and relieved to hear that I don't have a tumour in the back of my eye - or at the neurosurgeon for the results of my MRI and everything in my spine is fine - yep, even asked him if there was any sign of cancer. So I've never thought that this was going to kill me but I am afraid of it coming back. I don't think you cannot be afraid of this once you have it. 

And guess what the unofficial ninth principle is from Radical Remission?

Exercise

That's right - exercise. I don't think I need to repeat what I've already said about strength training and cardio but that's right exercise is extremely important - if you don't do much or any at all, start. If you do it regularly, then keep it up. Remember what I said about stopping and thinking about what was important to you? Well here comes the lecture - start exercising - even if its walking around a few blocks or taking a few moments to get up from your desk and stretch. Start. Pre-cancer, I was active but I wasn't actively exercising and now I can't imagine my life without it especially since exercise and what you put in your mouth are the two things that you can control and will make the biggest difference in your life when it comes to growing old - both for your mind and body. 

Lecture over. Now get out behind that computer and take a walk, we all spend way too much time on our asses.

(This isn't me, but I couldn't think of a better picture)

Cancer Holidays - Weeks 36, 37 and 38 - The recovery journey has begun and I'm lagging behind...

Yep that's right - recovery isn't happening as quickly as I thought it would. Actually, its not bad if I stick to a light routine of going to bed at 10:00pm (getting about 10 hours of sleep each night), going to the gym and appointments (acupuncture, massage, check ups) and throw in a lunch or two with Preety or friends from work and I'm good. If I throw in a late night or an afternoon of gardening in the sun, I'm done the next day - or worse - it actually makes me feel sick - basically like a hangover but without the fun drinking part with headache, nausea and fatigue. It reminds me of having chemo unfortunately.

I've tested out this theory a few times to be sure. I felt it after returning home from the cottage on the May long weekend. I went to my sister's for a 5-day visit which included a visit with the university gals in Guelph (it was a late night of sober chatting - no kidding) and by the afternoon the next day I wasn't feeling well and felt really gross the following morning after that. And just this past weekend we were at Ann and Mike's for game night (we left at 11:30 pm) and the next day I slept until almost 11:00 am (I could've sworn when I woke up it wasn't any later than 8:00 am before looking at the clock). 

In addition to the fatigue, I have been suffering the effects of chemo brain - even though chemo was 6 months ago - now I know what they were talking about. My cognitive abilities are decreased and seem to become apparent when I do things that take some concentration (like playing board games believe it or not) and I struggle for words sometimes or completely mix up words, like say garage sale instead of grocery store. The weirdest example I can give was when we were at the cottage and we were lying in bed in the morning and May was whining. Instead of me saying "May!" (in a firm tone) I said "Cher!". Dom asked 'who's Cher?' I had no idea - and no I wasn't thinking of Cher or had dreamt of her the night before. In fact, I cannot think of the last time I heard a song by Cher or saw a picture of her but obviously somewhere in the depths of my brain she was there. Remember this outfit?





 All in all, this has made me feel like a bit of an old lady and will surely solidify my nickname of Nanny Knight by my friends here in Ottawa. But I guess this is all part of recovery - recognizing that I am still working on it - and after 8 months of chemo, surgery and radiation, I am not Wonder Woman and can't just jump right back into regular life. Keep in mind, I haven't even started back to work yet - so obviously I've got a ways to go in that department. 

Okay new topic - my visit to Ingersoll. It was a bitter sweet one because as some of you know Narissa and Drew's dog Jett died the night before I arrived. So it was initially a sad visit but at least I was able to distract Sam and Devin for a few days. Jett was a great dog and such a permanent member of the Ferguson family that I frequently forgot that he was no longer around and felt very sad when I realized my blunder. There are few dogs in the world who were as gentle as Jett was - a gentle giant for sure - the only dog that truly put up with my nasty little dog Olive.  This is my favourite picture of Lola and Jett, they were pals.

While at home I got to have a good, long chat with an old friend Heather Mackenzie, saw my two friends Laurel and April, visited with the real Nanny Knight, the university gals and Becky and Bailey for an afternoon.

This past weekend April was in town for a horse show so Dom and I went to Carp and hung out at the fairgrounds for the afternoon. It was a relaxing day. This is April and her horse Leo.

This is Buster and I watching April compete.

Dom and I also went to a FIFA soccer game on the weekend - we're going to a few more games in the next two weeks. Man, its good soccer - those chicks are really good! So far, I have to admit I like it better than the Fury games...

I also started my group therapy, finally. I've had two sessions and so far its good. The group is pretty varied in age and in stages of recovery - it ranges from a few months since treatment ended (me) to almost five years after treatment has ended - but we've all had some sort of breast cancer so we've got that in common. Basically we work through a topic every week so its pretty structured which is good - I like that - structure, that is. 

So in my last post I promised that I would go through the principles that I took from the book Radical Remission as my way of tackling my cancer. The book was a collection of research of people who went into remission by using a variety of different techniques (some of it including conventional treatment) and the principles are basically the 'top ten' things that came up out of this research. 

As you will probably recall, the first principle was Radically Changing Your Diet - where I ranted a lot about sugar. The second principle is:

Taking Control of Your Health
For me this meant that I needed to make sure I was getting the most out of my treatment as possible which was a holistic approach to treatment and making sure that even though the cancer centre didn't offer this and Dr. Dent never even came close to talking about it, it was important to me to be in charge of my own treatment - hence taking charge of my health. That's how I came to having acupuncture, going to massage and taking supplements and being on a special diet (ketogenic) while in treatment. Lucky for me, I am good at project management and since I wasn't working I didn't really have any project to manage except my cancer. As a side note, this wasn't the only book that I read that suggested that taking control of your health is key to cancer treatment - that was basically in every book I read on the subject. It doesn't mean that I had to read a tonne of medical journal articles (which I did) or a pile of books about cancer (which I did) but it did mean that I didn't limit myself to only conventional cancer treatment and go with my instinct. 

My oncologists are experts in conventional cancer treatment but they aren't experts in nutrition, supplements, different techniques to make chemo more effective (like fasting and ketogenic diets), acupuncture and massage. Ask any dietitian about getting advice from your doctor on nutrition and they'll cringe because doctors are not experts in nutrition (I've got a few friends who are dietitians so trust me, I know their reaction). A good example of this is when I was visiting Nan we went grocery shopping and she said that her doctor told her that she needed to eat a banana a day because she needed potassium. I told Nan that there are a lot of other foods that are higher in potassium like avocado, potatoes, sweet potatoes, yogurt, leafy green vegetables etc. When we got home from the grocery store, we figured out that Nan was getting more than enough potassium from all of these foods compared to the banana that her doctor recommended. 

The next principle is:

Following your intuition
I touched on this a bit in the last few paragraphs but I think this is key for anyone facing any sort of disease or challenge in their lives. Going with your gut is super important. When you get cancer a lot of people give you a lot of advice - some good, some bad, some ridiculous. And when you see your doctor its really important to follow your instinct. For me, it was to have chemo before surgery - I thought that was the right approach - its a scary one because that means that you live for what seems like a long time, with this tumour that you know is cancer, rather than having the satisfaction of having it removed right away. I also knew that it was important for me to see Dr. Craig, Tran and Meagan (massage therapist) even though my oncologist didn't seem to even acknowledge what I was doing. This could scare off a lot of people - especially if you doctors advise against complementary therapies - but for me I knew it was important and didn't really care that Dr. Dent didn't want to hear about it. I'm not sure if its a generational thing or if its because my Mom was a medical secretary so I know that doctors are human and don't know everything about everything but it was my instinct to seek advice from a number of different professionals, read a lot about my cancer and then make my own decisions on things. 

The next principle is:

Taking Herbs and Supplements
I relied on Dr. Craig's expertise to provide me with supplements through my treatment (I continue to take some although not nearly as many as I used to). I think this made a huge difference during my treatment and also for my overall health. There are so many different types of supplements that I took - some of the most popular being ECGC (the element in green tea thats anti-cancer), Indo-carbinol-3 which is found in brocolli sprouts which is thought to inhibit cancer growth, melatonin (cancer rates in people who do shift work are higher and it is thought that this has to do with a disruption/lack of melatonin) and vitamin C (there's lots of research on the effects of vitamin C and your immune system). And there are so many herbs that you can eat that are so beneficial to your overall health and that fight cancer. The top one of all time is tumeric - this is a huge anti-inflammatory and it is theorized that the dominance of tumeric in Indian food is the reason for low cancer rates in India. Cinnamon is another one that's a great anti-inflammatory and also stabilizes your blood sugar (so you aren't releasing too much insulin which contains IGF-1 which feeds cancer cells). Garlic and ginger are two other foods - I guess they aren't herbs really - just roots but they are great anti-inflammatory foods and have cancer fighting elements to them. Anyway, the idea with this principle is that you should supplement your cancer treatment with these types of things to help the fight. In many cases oncologists might not know about the benefits of supplements and herbs so that's where Dr. Craig's expertise came in handy. For example, when I was getting Taxol - the one type of chemo - I was having joint pain which is a common side effect - but Dr. Craig noticed that I deficient in magnesium - and guess what? A magnesium deficiency causes joint pain. So I took a supplement and this side effect disappeared. 

The next few principles are more touchy-feely ones so I'll save that for my next post. I did want to leave you with a video that I just watched today. Its a good explanation of what I worry about and what I'm sure a lot of people worry about after their cancer treatment is over - because for us who have/had cancer, its never really over. Even though my tumour is gone and treatment is done my oncologist hasn't declared me cancer-free - I'm not even sure if they ever will or if someday they will say I'm in remission - I never take off that little cancer backpack. This is a tear-jerker of a video and I think is applicable to anyone who has had or has cancer and I couldn't have said it any better. Grab a tissue.

Metastatic Breast Cancer 

Cancer Holidays - Weeks 33, 34 and 35 - Believe it or not, its been a year...

Hello!

How cool is that? My Mom was up last week and we went to the Inside Out exhibit at the Museum of Nature. If you get a chance to go - do it! Its super cool - the insides of all different kinds of animals. Here are a few other photos I took. 

We also stopped in to look at the bugs which is always my favourite part of the Museum - as you can tell by my Mom's expression, maybe not one of her favourites!

We also went to the Tulip Festival - believe it or not, I've never been even though I've lived in Ottawa for almost 6 years. 

We also had Dom's parents over on Mother's Day for dinner - the first time I've cooked dinner for more than just Dom and I in a long time. It was nice to give back after all of the meals I received during my cancer treatment. I've spent the last three weeks puttering around the house, going to the gym and going out for lunch with a few different friends from work and of course, my friend Preety. I took Preety to Bobby's Table for breakfast one morning - she had never been but she like it - and who doesn't like Bobby's Table especially for breakfast. 

I got this great cancer present from Cheryl and Selma - the solution to "light drinking". I think this is super funny and according to Cheryl, it actually fits a whole bottle of wine.

Oh and Dom's band played twice in one week - one was at a small bar on a Tuesday night and the other was at Zaphod's for a Nepal earthquake fundraiser (apparently they raised more than $3000 which is impressive). 

There weren't many people on the Tuesday night - it was me, two of Dom's friends Marc and Sam and a gaggle of teachers that Hugo works with. I don't know Hugo very well as he is their new guitarist (in the photo on the left) but he must be the most popular eligible bachelor in his school right now because there were the three of us and then like 7 or 8 teachers (all women).
 
Other than that, the last three weeks have been pretty quiet. I have been going to acupuncture regularly and Tran has me on some Chinese herbs to help with the night sweats. This is what they look like. 

Basically they look like a mix of weed and magic mushrooms but trust me, they aren't. So I have seven baggies of these herbs and I have to soak one every night, then boil them and then strain them and drink the water. I affectionately call it "Swamp Water" and yes, you guessed it - it pretty much tastes like swamp water. 

But I'm pretty sure its working because I forgot to drink it one day at the cottage this past weekend and I was getting hot flashes every hour and didn't sleep very well. 

My group therapy is starting at the beginning of June so stay tuned for that. Oh and there was an article in the Toronto Star about the therapy (I'm surprised that Uncle Rick didn't read it, cut it out for me and mail me the article - old school style). Here it is if you want to read it. Toronto Star article One comment about this article - Sophie describes cancer as a "backpack" that people carry around - I think if you'll remember I described it the exact same way in the last blog entry (just saying). 

Also I joined a Facebook group called Rethink - for young women with breast cancer and its really cool actually. I am going to the Green Door Cafe on Sunday night for dinner and to meet the group and I've also signed up for a cooking class with the group at the OICC on June 7th so that sounds like fun too. I have a funny feeling my cancer friend circle may get a bit bigger in the near future which is a complete infraction to my 'no friends with cancer rule' but as Preety taught me, having a few like-minded people with cancer as friends isn't so bad - its actually great. You can make jokes about having cancer that other people wouldn't understand (or even might find offensive) and you can chat freely about the side effects of cancer without the other person feeling bad for you. Plus you just feel like somehow someone understands you without even having to explain it.

So through this group I've made one new friend, Jaclyn. We met for coffee last week and shared our (strangely) similar cancer experience, plus she's from Southern Ontario so she gets points for that. And, she had her wedding reception at my friend's restaurant in Exeter (Eddington's of Exeter) - small world eh? 

I went to see my Family Doctor (Dr. Gagnon) this past week since I hadn't seen her since pre-cancer. She knew all about the past nine months because the cancer centre sent her every test, progress report that I had so it honestly, wasn't much of an appointment. I am going for bloodwork just to test a few things that Dr. Craig wanted to know and to check my lymphocytes (a type of white blood cell) because it was low after I finished chemo, right before my surgery. Its weird because when you get chemo you get a blood test every two weeks before chemo and when you are done, my oncologist never had me get another blood test to see if my body bounced back from chemo which I've always thought was weird. Dr. Beaulieu had my blood tested before surgery but not for all of the things that they test for with the chemo blood tests. Just one of those things I guess, but I'm not worried because Dr. Craig and Dr. Gagnon seemed to have picked up the slack on that. 

We went to the cottage over the long weekend and I'm sure like everywhere this past weekend the weather was up and down but overall it was a good weekend. We stayed at my Mom's for the first few nights then over to my Dad's cottage until Tuesday. I didn't take any photos except this:

Here are the ones Dom took:

This one is cool - fries out of a vending machine!

Silly Dom (this is actually in the front yard of a veterinarians along Highway 21 outside of Port Elgin).

Fat May sunbathing and listening to tunes. 

Lola trying to keep warm

Me trying to keep warm!

  

There were a few flies at the beach too.

Overall, a good weekend but it was also an important weekend for me since the last time I was up at the cottage it was a few days after my first chemo and I didn't really know what the future had in store for me. I didn't think I was going to die - I've never had that dreaded feeling that I wasn't going to survive this cancer thing - but it was a very unknown time. 

In addition to that, this month last year is when I first found the tumour (hence the title of this entry). I couldn't tell you exactly which day it was but I know it was on the weekend and I was standing at the patio door because I had just let the dogs out and was watching Lola chase Steve (our resident red squirrel) and scratched the side of my boob and found the tumour. Of course at that time, I didn't think/know it was a tumour and I would spend the rest of the summer (until I went to see Dr. Beaulieu in August) thinking it was just a fibroadenoma because that's what everyone kept telling me. Plus they said that the lump was not what most breast cancers feel like since it was right under the skin - normally they are apparently buried in breast tissue. 

So in my last post I said that I'd start to go over what I did in terms of making changes in my life while in cancer treatment. I got this idea from a book Radical Remission. It was the first cancer book I read and the best one. I know I've said this before, but if you know someone who is newly diagnosed with cancer give them this book to read. Its not all touchy feely and does not say that everyone can cure their own cancer. What it does do, is examine what people did in their lives once they got their cancer diagnosis and who came through it the other side, in many cases in spite of what their doctors said their chances were. So the author is PhD student who was studying to become an oncologist and realized that there were all of these people who went into 'remission' and doctors couldn't explain why.  And that the doctors that were treating these people almost never documented what their patients did on their own to get to the remission stage. It seems that when these people went into remission, the doctors just sent them on their way without asking any questions. That's where Dr. Turner comes in - she went all over the world interviewing people to find out what they did for themselves. Then she took the top ten most common things that people did and wrote a book about it. After I read the book I wrote down these ten things in my cancer book (as an aside, everyone with cancer should have a notebook to jot stuff down - questions for doctors, books to read, phone numbers etc) and worked on them in some way over the past nine months. So I'll start with the first one and the next few posts I'll go through the rest (this will at least provide me with some more cancer-like topics for the blog!). 

1. Radically changing your diet

Pre-cancer I thought that my diet was pretty good. Once I met Dr. Craig and he put me on a ketogenic diet (no carbs, no sugar) during chemo and then while having radiation, I realized how many carbs and sugar I actually did eat - and I am not one of those people who loves baked goods so if you are, you also probably eat way too many carbs and sugar. I also stopped eating dairy while on chemo too (just like Joan Lunden!). It was a really tough diet for a few reasons. 

One, I was totally addicted to sugar - and here is where I am going to vent for a minute. I liked candy and not really chocolate (except now as you know dark chocolate is my thing) but once I started paying attention to sugar I immediately realized how much sugar I was consuming - not just in candy but in every day foods. I spent hours at the grocery store looking at food labels realizing there is sugar in EVERYTHING. Canned vegetables (yep, just look especially canned tomatoes - tonnes of sugar), salad dressings, condiments, any foods basically in a box - frozen lasagna as an example - and my all time biggest annoyance, bread. I know I didn't eat bread while on my ketogenic diet but now I'm venting for present day. We've started buying bread at a bakery near Dom's work because it is too difficult to find bread with no sugar (this includes glucose, fructose, corn syrup etc). Actually this past week I tried to find hamburger buns with no sugar and after looking at every label at Farm Boy and Loblaws I've figured out there are no hamburger buns without sugar being the second or third ingredient. In case you didn't know, the order of ingredients are important because they go in order of quantity (the first ingredient being the most and the last being the smallest amount). So, if you find hamburger buns without sugar let me know. Our bakery that Dom goes to doesn't make hamburger buns so I'll have to hit up a few in the next little while to see if I can find some. By the way, the World Health Organization recommends that you do not consume more than 25 grams of added sugar a day (not including fruit) - try it and see if you can do it. Its tough especially if you haven't been paying attention to added sugar in things like bread and salad dressings. Oh and there is this new documentary about sugar that's playing tonight at the Mayfair if you are interested in going Sugar Coated it's called.

Two, despite that I thought we ate well, we didn't eat the variety of vegetables that I thought we did. I have discovered a lot of different vegetables over the past nine months that have become regular vegetables in our diet - ones that I probably wouldn't eat nearly as much if it wasn't for the cancer. Swiss chard, bok choy, kale (although not my favourite), chick peas (thanks to Ann I like these now), cauliflower, mushrooms (all different kinds not just white button ones), spaghetti squash, spinach are all vegetables we eat regularly now - that means we have more vegetables at meals than we do meat or carbs like pasta or bread. In fact, we hardly ever eat pasta anymore (much to Dom's disappointment) and when we do, I don't really eat much. I always make spaghetti squash to either eat in place of pasta or add a few pieces of pasta to the squash. Dom eats the rest of the pasta. And we hardly eat potatoes (although I've never been a potato fan) so when we do its sweet potatoes (again, much to Dom's disappointment). Oh and out of your 7 servings of fruits and vegetables a day - only about 2 should be from fruit, the rest from vegetables. I've been using that app I mentioned in my last blog, I have only managed to reach 7 servings of vegetables and fruit a handful of times after about a month - so if you've done better way to go. Pretty surprising for someone who pays an inordinate amount of time paying attention to her diet.   

Three, almost everything we eat now is organic. I'm not a lecturer about organics and if we are at someone else's place or restaurant I'm not worried about eating organic but at home almost everything we eat is organic. I know there are still chemicals in organic foods but there are less and what I figure is that it can't hurt - except of course your pocketbook - but for us, its worth it.    

Four, we eat a lot more fish. I didn't realize how much meat we ate until we switched to fish and tried to reduce our meat intake overall (especially red meat). I also care more about where it comes from because it is proven that chicken that's grain fed and beef that's grass fed has better nutrition and higher concentrations of good things like Omega-3. This is harder than you might think and more expensive too unless you are like me and only buy the good meat when its reduced and freeze it for later. If you aren't buying omega-3 eggs start, otherwise you aren't getting nearly the amount of omega-3's as you normally would. 

Five, drinking alcohol. If you know me, you know that I love my red wine. I stopped drinking all together during cancer treatment mainly because I didn't feel great and never wanted to jeopardize the times when I did feel good with a headache or upset stomach from red wine. For breast cancer risk, if you drink even a few glasses a week it can significantly increase your risk for certain breast cancers. For triple negative breast cancers, there have recently been some studies that indicate drinking red wine might be beneficial (yes!) so I have a few glasses a week but don't drink nearly as much as I used to. Plus, with feeling basically not well from chemo, surgery and radiation I don't dare have more than two glasses in one night (which makes me feel woozy anyway) because I don't ever want to feel sick again (when I had the flu a few weeks ago and felt nauseous it actually upset me because it reminded me so much of being on chemo). So, for those of you who drink more than a few glasses a week especially if its not red wine be aware that this increases your risk for cancer - if you smoke its a hundred times worse so don't even get me started. If you are someone like Dom, you believe wholeheartedly that craft beer is actually good for you (and he's not wrong) so if you drink craft beer you are better off than those Coors Light, Canadian, Blue drinkers. 

In the book, there are a lot of people that had really bad diets - like really bad. Fast food a few times a week and most home meals out of boxes but that wasn't us so its all perspective. Some people when they get cancer have really unhealthy habits and others aren't so bad. If you want to challenge yourself - do even one of the things I listed above. Try not drinking for a week - or cut out carbs or sugar - I guarantee you it will be a challenge - one that you probably would never have imagined is that difficult until you try.  Dom has a friend who doesn't drink for the entire month of January - maybe just to give him a reminder of how much he does drink - but its a great idea. I like to think my diet was in the not so bad category - as opposed to really bad - so changing my diet wasn't that difficult. I give kudos to my mom for this - even though my childhood has many memories of casserole (some fond, some not) my mom always made us meals. It was a treat even to have tacos or something like that, I'm sure because she couldn't make the taco shells. And whenever we asked 'what's for dessert?' my mom would always answer (much to our disappointment) "well, there's fruit'.  Thanks Mom.  

 

Cancer Holidays - Weeks 31 and 32 - Cancer Guilt

Before I get to the Debbie Downer topic of the Cancer Guilt part of this blog posting I'll start it off on a happy note and give a little recap of the past two weeks. 

I continue to go to massage and acupuncture although I have reduced my massage visits to every other week. I do still go to acupuncture weekly though - mainly for the night sweats and hot flashes that I still have. In fact, over Easter and they got a lot worse which I'm sure was because I missed my weekly acupuncture visit. Its not the most pleasant treatment right now since I regularly get needles in the bottom of my feet now which is totally creepy. But its totally worth it because I think it makes a huge difference. This week Tran said that he will be prescribing me some Chinese herbs to take to help out so I'm looking forward to that (well not really because he said it tastes really bad).

On Thursday night last week, Dom went to visit his grandpa at the hospital because he was not doing very well. When I got up on Friday morning Dom told me that his grandpa died late Thursday night so it was a sad day for us - rest in peace M. Bouchard. 
 
As you all are probably aware, the hockey playoffs are on so that's been the main topic in our house the past two weeks. We went over to my friend Preety's house last weekend and watched the hockey game with Preety, Nigel, Anne and Jordan. It was a well balanced group since Preety and Dom are Habs fans (I am by default, I can't be anything else in this house) and Anne, Jordan and Nigel are Senators fans. Since Dom and Jordan are both craft beer connoisseurs there was a lot of chatting about beer as well as music. All in all, it was a great night. I must say its very different basically being a "light drinker" now. I still enjoy a glass of wine at dinner most nights but if I know I'm going out I usually save it for the social function but I stop at just the one glass - I know, I know that's weird for me. Anyway, I don't mind it which is not something that I ever thought I'd say - I'm sure Dom loves it because he's always got a DD with him so he's free to enjoy that extra growler of beer if he wants. For me, its liberating waking up the next day without that foggy feeling in my head. 

On Saturday I headed to Leanna's house to return Cooper and to also hang out with the Langille's and head to our university get together the next day at my friend Heather's place. 

As you can see, Cooper was a great addition to our house - he even joined in watching the hockey playoffs. And he was great company for me in the mornings - this is how we spent every morning.

In case you are wondering Lola isn't allowed on the furniture (I know, its not fair but those are the rules) and Fat May is too fat most times to jump up on the furniture and even if she does, she doesn't stay long. So Cooper was more than welcome to join me. Fat May is really fat - she got a haircut recently that really shows off her curves.  

Lucky for Fat May, the vet keeps careful track of her weight - she was in this past week for some vaccines and she got weighed too. They gave me a graph that shows her weight since I've had her. 

You don't really have to see the numbers clearly to get the idea that Fat May's weight has basically been on a gradual incline since I adopted her. In my defence, she's got terrible food allergies and hypo-allergenic food is typically higher in calories than regular food and it was a long, cold winter so we had few walks - but the chart doesn't lie - Fat May is the heaviest she's ever been. Because of her food allergies she gets no treats - nothing, not a drop of anything other than her kibble but obviously we've got an issue. So I'm just taking this as more motivation to stay very active and Fat May has been exercising more and has had a reduction in her food (I've always measured her food but now we've reduced it from 1/3 cup to 1/4 cup twice a day). My goal is that the next time we are at the vet's, which will be in August, that her weight has reduced at least a little bit. 

On Sunday, I went along with the Langille's to Heather's house for our get together. I have no pictures to show you but I can say that it was great to see everyone. After knowing each other for more than 15 years (its more like 19 years) its great to know that these friends are the kind where you just fall right back into step with each other. Most of us are married - and the majority have kids so when you add them all in it makes for a big group. I stayed at Leanna's place Sunday night and headed back to Ottawa on Monday - as usual I was exhausted when I got home. It seems like when I go away (so far that was only my second time leaving Ottawa in 8 months) I am totally exhausted when I get home - a reminder that my body has a lot more healing to do, I guess. Dom was home on Monday because he wasn't feeling well and the two of us pretty much spent all of last week fighting off cold/flu symptoms. 

But that didn't stop us from going to a Fury game on Wednesday last week and it was a treat because Dom's friend Jessie (who has seasons tickets beside us) won tickets at work for club seats which meant we had free food and non-alcoholic drinks. It was cool but at least it didn't rain. Here we are in our fancy seats:

Dom was off sick on and off last week fighting his cold while I thought I was healthier than him but on Saturday that proved me wrong - I woke up with a headache and upset stomach and I went back to bed after about an hour and didn't get out of bed until Sunday morning! Even as I write this I am still not right - I went to the gym today and felt good but as I was walking back to the car I started to feel bad again. I figure I am due to get sick seeing as despite chemo, surgery and radiation - all of those visits to the hospital - I didn't get sick at all this winter. So I am drinking ginger tea and taking it easy when I need to. 

On Sunday we went out for breakfast with Ann and Mike which was great - I love having breakfast out somewhere. Somehow eggs taste better when someone else makes them. Yesterday was Dom's grandpa's memorial service and even though I got up to get ready, I didn't go - I had slept terribly and could tell my flu was back so I went back to bed to wake up at 12:30 just enough time to get ready for my appointment with Dr. Beaulieu...and now we transition into the cancer part... 

Dr. Beaulieu is my surgeon and the one who told me I had cancer way back in August. She is by far my favourite doctor in this whole scenario - well tied with Dr. Craig but they are very different doctors so its hard to compare them really. Dr. B was really pleased with the way my incisions have healed and was even more impressed with how my chest has healed from radiation. You can still see burn but she said in her experience everything looks really good. We also talked about follow-up care and so I'll be getting yearly mammograms at the Monfort Hospital for the foreseeable future. Dr. B did tell me originally that mammograms are not great at detecting cancer in people my age but after you do have cancer and cancer treatment they are actually better than MRIs, CT scans, PET scans or ultrasounds since mammograms are able to detect micro-calcifications better than any of the other tests so this was new information to me. I am glad that I am getting some sort of follow-up tests plus I have to go and see my family doctor every year for a check up. I have an appointment with her already next month. I also see Dr. Dent in June and back to see Dr. Caudrelier in September so everyone is definitely keeping an eye on me which makes me feel a lot better.

This past week I had my usual bi-weekly (or is it bi-monthly?) chat with Becky and Courtney and I started talking to them about what I call Cancer Guilt - they told me after we chatted about it that I should write about it in my blog because its not something that they ever thought of and there are probably a lot of people who would like to know about it. So I don't think this guilt is specific to cancer, insert your disease/illness here and follow it with the word "guilt" - but I am sure that I am not the only one who feels this way. So, what is it you ask? Its guilt that the sick person feels because they are bringing bad news and sadness to people around them. Its hard to explain really but its the reason that most of you found out I had cancer by email or text message and why for the first few weeks that I was diagnosed it was really difficult to talk about. It was hard enough telling my parents let alone my siblings, extended family, friends and co-workers not because I was upset that I had cancer but because its really upsetting telling people bad news about yourself - because you are upsetting other people (don't even get me started about having to tell Dom). 

Now before you send me emails telling me I have nothing to feel guilty about - I know logically that I should not feel guilty about having cancer but try to put yourself in the shoes of someone who has to tell everyone they know this kind of news - see the looks on their faces, hear them cry on the phone and get those emails and text messages that say they are devastated to hear this news - and then try to imagine yourself not feeling bad about it. I think at first I felt bad about it but I didn't realize until the past month that the "bad" feeling is guilt. If you know anything about me, you know that I am straight shooter - I say what I think - and I don't often feel guilty about things of course because I'm perfect - kidding - I think because I try to live as authentic as I can. 

So its taken me a long time to figure this out. I also think this is the reason why it is hard for people in my position to accept a lot of social support and help - you already feel guilty that you've made people feel bad - and that makes it more difficult to accept help. The only reason why I didn't fall into that trap is because most of the reading that I did when I was first diagnosed emphasized a lot that you need to accept social support in a variety of ways and that this acceptance improved your chances of surviving cancer (you can't argue with that). So that's what it is, Cancer Guilt. Its not something that I can fix or something that any one of you needs to apologize for - I know that the only reason that you are upset is because you care about me. I have been lucky in some ways in that I don't really know what its like to be in your position. I haven't even had a grandparent sick (well both my grandpas died when I was very young so I don't remember) but Grandma Fink and Nanny Knight are doing fine! I'm not like all of you, I haven't had to watch someone else go through something like this so I don't know what it feels like on the other side. What I do know is that I think I am starting to figure out this mental cancer thing a bit more but its still a work in progress. I haven't started my group therapy yet but I will be sure to bring this up when I do and see what the response is. My guess is that a lot of people feel this way. I know that after going through treatment I also think about how bad I would feel if my cancer came back and part of that - a big part - is that I'd have to break the news to everyone again and in some weird way disappoint people - I know, I know, not logical but you just can't help the way you feel. 

Just to rant for a moment - Cancer Guilt and other things like what happens at the end of your treatment, the fact that doctors don't really declare you cancer free (at least not at first) are all things that people don't tell you about. There's no mention of this in the brochures that you get and no mention of it from doctors either (although I do have to admit that one oncologist that was filling in for Dr. Dent did mention the tough mental part of ending treatment but no specifics, suggestions or referrals on how to get help). This is the part of cancer treatment that seems to be largely ignored at least from where I am sitting - so if you know someone else who has cancer or is going through some other major health crisis don't just assume that since the physical treatment is over, its really over. The more and more I am thinking about things, the more I wonder if it really is ever over - that damn tiny cancer backpack again! So that's it - that's the Cancer Guilt - a popular theme I hear is Survivor's Guilt which is interesting but not something I can say that I have experienced so far...my next blog entries will have some more information on this, I'm going to do some research. I'm also going to tell you about the top ten things that I did through this whole cancer thing in case you are interested. Next entry I'll start with a few of them - think of them like Dave Letterman's Top Ten list but probably not as funny - well I'll try to make it funny.

I have no segway into this but for all of you Ottawa folks take note that Dom's band Sonic Defense is playing at a Benefit Show for Nepal Earthquake Relief at Zaphod's on Friday, May 8th - its a $10 admission, there will be other bands, silent auction, door prizes and a whole bunch of stuff so mark it on your calendars. All of the money goes towards Doctors Without Borders and the Canadian Red Cross. If you cannot make it, I hope that you can at least donate some money to a charity of your choice to help out.

And to end on a lighter note in honour of Dom and his grandpa:

Go Habs!!!!!