My Cancer Journey : Almost 5 months after the diagnosis
The past 130 days or so have been a hugely intense trip.
From shock and confusion to clarity and certainty.
From negativity to positivity.
From “no knowledge” to “just enough knowledge”.
But the biggest factor is that I’ve thrown everything I could get my hands on and at my cancer diagnosis and deep down I think that I will come out the other end relatively unscathed.
Over the past 4 plus months I have tried hard to understand cancer as well as to put together a list of treatments and strategies that I felt confident and comfortable with.
I have applied everything that I possibly could toward creating a chronic stress on and against the cancer cells in my body and at the same time hitting them with acute attacks.
In some ways it has been like a war.
The battle has been fought against mutated cells that want to survive and proliferate and eventually take over my body.
My job has been to attack and kill these cells with as little collateral damage as possible.
Last night I re-visited the subject of cancer.
I realized that at some point all of my attention went onto the cures that might be possible and I threw myself into learning about these and took my attention off the basic understanding of what cancer is.
“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.” ― Sun Tzu, The Art of War
I won’t speculate on the cause of my cancer. It could have been one or more of many things that got the ball rolling and the cells splitting.
I’m at a point now where I can possibly understand cancer in a far more comprehensive manner than I could back when I first got my diagnosis in November last year. I think the time has come to re-visit the subject.
From all counts I have what is known as Metasticized Squamous Cell Carcinoma (of an unknown primary). The most advanced scans could not find any other evidence of cancer apart from in my lymph node on the left side of my neck. I had 2 needle biopsies that confirmed that I had malignant SCC cells in the lymph node. I also had 2 operations to remove material from the tonsil area and at the base of my tongue. The pathologists could not find any signs of cancer from this material. Based on my limited knowledge cancer travels through the blood stream or through the lymphatic system. It has to start somewhere. In my case, that somewhere could be anywhere on or in my body. SCC is a cancer of the skin, internal or external. My SCC has found it’s way to my lymph nodes on the left side of my neck.
After 33 doses of radiotherapy over 6.5 weeks my lymph node and immediate surrounding cells and tissues have been blasted by a small dose of targeted radiation that builds up over the time of the treatment. Now that the radiation treatment has finished I am beginning to feel some side effects but overall they appear to be minimal compared to what might have been expected. Diminished taste, thicker than usual saliva, slight periods of fatigue, red skin in the targeted area, limited hair loss, slight brain fog and forgetfulness.
My overall goal has been to apply the “Press-Pulse” theory to the cancer cells.
Healthy, Clean Ketogenic Diet specifically for Cancer.
What I mean by this is to create a chronically stressed environment for the cancer cells by being on a low carb (about 20 grams a day), high fat (180 grams), moderate protein (60 grams) ketogenic diet, thereby depriving the cancer cells of glucose and to a lesser degree glutamine.
I used an app called Cronometer to record every bit of food and drink that I put into my body every day. This takes ages but it is worth every bit of effort to have the exact measurements of my macros. It put me in control of my diet.
Over the treatment period I have been able to convert my fuel supply for my body and brain to ketone bodies as opposed to glucose. This means that my body is running on fat as my main fuel. Cancer thrives on sugar/glucose. From my research I have concluded that cancer cannot use ketones as a fuel. This consequently slows the growth of the cancer significantly.
How do I know this is working? I do blood tests every day. I check my blood glucose and blood ketones with a special machine generally used by Diabetics. My blood glucose has been stably in the 4-5 range and my ketones are pretty much always above 2. This shows that I am well and truly in a state of nutritional ketosis.
The theory is that without glucose to feed on, the cancer cells ability to proliferate will be slowed down plus the radiation treatment will be made more effective because the cancer cells will become more susceptible to the treatment while the healthy cells will go into protection mode. This appeared to have worked for me based on the nurses comments about how well I responded to the treatment and how few side effects that I experienced.
The second line of attack has been Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy. Over a period of 2 months I did 60 hours plus of supervised HBOT. The basic principle here is that the oxygen acts as a “pulse” and attacks the cancer cells, potentially killing them. HBOT is also known to help heal wounds faster and in my case I firmly believe that it helped minimise. The pulse factor in press pulse is like an acute attack after the “species” has been run down and weakened by the chronic stress from the “press” component.
Cancer thrives in a low oxygen, high sugar environment. It uses glucose to metabolize energy through fermentation as opposed to the healthy cells which metabolize through respiration. The oxygen also attacks the cancer cells by producing ROS (reactive oxygen species, also known as free radicals) that attack the cancer cells.
At this point I have to say that this data is based on my limited understanding of the data that I have studied, I knew nothing about biochemistry, metabolism etc when I was first diagnosed and had to start learning from scratch. I cannot vouch for the effectiveness of this information but I have used it on myself to a positive effect.
The third attack front has been through a 13 week regime of intravenous Vitamin C, Curcumin, DCA and Quercetin.
Curcumin is herbal compound that has been shown to have anti-cancer effects in pre-clinical and clinical studies. The anti-cancer effects of curcumin include inhibiting the carcinogenesis, inhibiting angiogenesis, and inhibiting tumour growth.
There’s still no evidence that vitamin C alone can cure cancer, but researchers are studying whether it might boost the effectiveness of other cancer treatments, such as chemotherapy and radiation therapy, or reduce treatment side effects.
On top of this I started a program of immunotherapy using Yervoy, Obdivo, Keytruda and Avastin which I pulled out of after 3 intravenous doses due to severe skin rash and immune response. The last part of this integrative treatment has been a course of GmCFS and GcMAF injections. Also had 2 IV treatments using Shogaol which was stopped due to the cost and unknown efficacy.
