Cancer Journal #112.

                                                                  

This is an article I have written for a local arts and entertainment newspaper in our area. Although it has been submitted, I have not gotten word as to whether it will be published. Much of what I have written here repeats what I have said in prior blog entries.

  Should be dead

I met with an oncologist on Nov 16, 2020.  He said I had an aggressive form of prostate cancer (8 on the Gleason scale) that had metastasized throughout the bones in my pelvic region, putting me at state 4 in cancer’s progression.  He told me that I had 3 to 5 years left to live.  No qualifiers or percentages less than 100.  The future foretold with certainty.  I took the news with a sort of grim acceptance.  I wrote a poem within the next couple of months.

       Steaming Into Port 

 I see the ship up over the horizon

 its presence and position not obscured by fog.

 Its progress imperceptible except that 

 after not watching, it’s bigger when I look back. 

 Not much question where it’s heading. 

 It’s coming, straight line, right here. 

 The Good Ship Mortality. 

 It concentrates the mind

  as Samuel Johnson said. 

 Things lose their triviality

 as they become finite.

An edge of sadness

but only an edge.

If it's what's to be,

It's what's to be.

It didn’t happen.  By spring, 2021, my PSA, the indicator of prostate cancer activity, dropped to a point too low to be detectable and has remained there ever since.  A bone scan done during the summer, 2021 was clear of the bright spots that before had been lit up like a satellite image of the US East Coast.  I felt (and feel) just fine. The ship had turned, gone into the fog.

Do the arithmetic and you will note that, according to the original diagnosis, I am a dead man.  Why am I alive and well?  Dunno but I have some ideas.  First of all, I was the subject of earnest prayer by family members, those in my church and others too.  For all I know, the explanation starts and stops right there.  As we say, God is good.  Not my time.

And I have done some things.  Within a week or so of my diagnosis, I heard a story of a woman diagnosed with metastatic esophageal cancer, told she had six months to live.  Her husband was unwilling to accept that, did some research and put on a full court press against the ugly opponent.  He read How to Starve Cancer by Jane McClelland which offers novel treatments. When I learned of her, she was in her second year of life after the diagnosis and declared cancer free (which she remains to this day).

Among her nonstandard treatments was vitamin C infusion,  bypassing the digestive system and injecting a solution directly into the blood stream.  I started doing that in January or February, 2021.  I went in once a week, getting 100 grams of IVC as we call it.  I continue to do that on a maintenance basis, 50 grams once a month or so. 

I modified my diet.  A lot of broccoli and cauliflower and plant based protein.  I cut out sweets.  When I read about a supplement that is supposed to kill cancer, I order it.  Modified citrus pectin, Zeaxanthin and whatever else I come across.  It seems that horseradish has 20 times whatever broccoli has that combats cancer.  I bought a big homely root, tried getting it down and while my tolerance for hot and spicy is great, straight horseradish turned out to be too much.  By then, active cancer was a thing deemed dormant.  Maybe if it were to wake up, I would give it another shot.

A few months before my diagnosis, I had started with a fitness coach, working out twice a week an hour at a time.  I continued with that and still do.  I think that helps a lot but, of course, who knows.  I have read that according to a study done by the University of Tel Aviv, a program of high intensity interval training (HIIT) reduces the likelihood of metastatic cancer’s occurrence by up to 72%.  That is a very large number.  The theory is that the exertion depletes the sugar in the cells of the body, leaving none for cancer to live on. 

A friend of mine, a widow, lost her husband to prostate cancer.  A fine man who left this world before he should have.  She reports that he would crave sweet, eating spoonful after spoonful of honey and sugar.  Science has known for 100 years that cancer thrives on sugar.  Generally listening to your body is a good practice but when your body is harboring a deadly opponent, who knows who you are hearing.  You really don’t want to be provisioning the enemy.  

I have stayed with the standard treatment for prostate cancer provided by my health care clinic.  This includes a drug, Lupron, which turns off testosterone.  Ordinarily, this brings on great fatigue and has an adverse emotional impact.  While I enjoy my naps, fatigue is not a major issue with me.  My emotional state, after the first few months, has been good.  I go in every three months for my Lupron shot and a visit with the oncology specialist.  She marvels at how well I am doing, both in response to the Lupron and also my PSA numbers.

I have great respect for the competent patient care I receive by my standard health care provider.  However, I am puzzled by what I perceive as an institutional lack of curiosity about why I am doing so well.  Why aren’t I being interviewed?  After all, according to them, I should be dead.  Why don’t they want to know what went wrong?  I conclude that there are established protocols for how cancer is treated and those are not to be altered by those on front line patient care.  On one level, I guess I get it.  But on another level, I say, “Come on folks!  Up your game!”