Marcia McMahon, in radical remission from stage 4 breast cancer, and I talked on her Peaceful Planet podcast recently.
Among our topics were Mary Magdalene, Thriver Soup’s cover art by Margaret and Keith Klein, music by Sunflower, when I had an idea my cancer was over (a dream I had), energy healing, healthy eating, and of course, how to manage emotions. We also did a brief version of the guided visualization, A Conversation with Dis-ease.
The interview starts at 7:55. Enjoy!
Jacqui Roell, RN, BSN, who believes Thriver Soup saved her life, earned a 2018 Unsung Hero Award from Cancer Family Care.
A registered nurse for more than 25 years, Jacqui became the patient during 2017 with a breast cancer diagnosis. During her chemotherapy and radiation treatments, she used many alternative therapies, which she said allowed her to recover quickly.
She calls herself a living testament to how complementary therapies can benefit cancer patients before, during, and after medical treatments. “They can actually decrease, and in some cases remove, the need for many medications by allowing your body to heal itself and maintain its healthy balance naturally.”
Jacqui is an aromatherapist, a reflexologist, and a Reiki practitioner. She is adding healing touch, crystal therapy, and herbal supplementation to her business. She also is active in several cancer care and advocacy groups, including Pink Ribbon Girls and Cancer Family Care.
Jacqui was nominated for the award by her mother, Marilyn Seilkop, a fellow cancer survivor. Marilyn wrote, “She is a passionate advocate for patients and their families. In addition to interviews on local TV stations, Jackie is a frequent speaker at cancer care events she is a mentor for cancer patients and a hero to all who meet her.”
Jacqui’s Holistic Soul Wellness website is https://holisticsoulwellness.com/
What is your favorite complementary form of treatment?
I don’t know what it is about food your mother makes for you, especially when it’s something that anyone can make – pancakes, meat loaf, tuna salad – but it carries a certain taste of memory.
–Mitch Albom
In 1972, my mother was diagnosed with end-stage breast cancer. She surprised everyone by going into radical remission for seven years.
When the cancer came back, we didn’t know for awhile, but I felt a sickness in my belly on the morning I watched my mom and dad drive off for a trip south. About three hours later I got a call… she had stumbled and fallen—the result of a growing numbness in her spine, which turned out to be the return of the cancer. At the time, I was a teenaged college student. None of us had much of an idea what to do, think, or expect—especially my younger brother, who had just become a teenager.
This time the doctors predicted she would live six months. She got Prevention magazine (the only health magazine she probably could get back then), ate better food, and saw a hypnotherapist. Her goal was to live long enough for my younger brother to remember her.
Remarkably, she lived another three years.
She unknowingly taught me to explore options. Perhaps she helped save my life with her example.
All of us came to see her days before she passed. After a short visit I had to get back to Kansas if I wanted to keep my job. There was no hospice. After all us out-of-towners left, she crossed over, alone, in a hospital bed.
I remember the terrible phone call, the endless drive back to Iowa, and the torturous days that followed, like it was yesterday. This was my first real exposure to death.
Of course, I have lost many more people during the intervening 34 years, including my firstborn son.
This spring I listened to some old copies of cassette recordings from my childhood Christmases. With a heavy heart, I realized I had forgotten the sound of my own mother’s voice. I knew by the spoken words it was her, yet the timbre of her voice had faded from my memories.
The taste of her cooking had not. My younger brother was able to visit me this Mother’s Day. His memories of her were far more hazy, yet he remembered certain dishes that gave a feeling of comfort and belonging.
Together we made corn fritters, hamburger pie, Barb-b-cups, cheesecake, springerle cookies, and peanut brittle—unfit food we normally never eat. It brought a feast of memories and even some laughter. My younger son enjoyed the eats.
And I was able to glide busily and deliciously past my third mother’s day without my firstborn son. I appreciate this gift.
What did you do to mark Mother’s Day this year?
Source:
https://soyummy.co/mothers-day-quotes-food-moms-best-cooks/
Jacqui Roell, a Registered Nurse, says, “Thriver Soup saved my life!”
Jacqui was diagnosed with Stage 2b lobular breast cancer and a friend urged her to read Thriver Soup. The first thing Jacqui read in the book was, “I thought I had been sentenced to die. Instead, I had been invited to live joyfully so my soul could prosper” (p. 19).
Jacqui was not expecting to read something like that. She set Thriver Soup aside.
She had already decided not to do chemotherapy or radiation. Eventually she wanted to see what I suggested in the way of alternative treatments.
She opened up Thriver Soup again, and read, “At the start of my cancer journey, I had a long talk with Vince and Connie Lasorso at Whatever Works Wellness Center. For decades they have offered complementary treatment methods and emotional support to cancer patients. They told me the story of a woman who worked in the local holistic community and got cancer. She rejected all conventional treatments and focused on a variety of alternative healing practices. She ended up dying of cancer, acknowledging at the end that if she had received conventional medical care in the beginning, she probably would have survived. That story struck a note with me and I decided to follow what my doctors recommended.” (p. 25)
Jacqui says, “That was huge for me. It made me take a step back and reconsider my options. It gave me permission to do what my doctor wanted me to do, while also taking care of what I needed to do spiritually and mentally.”
Using the practical tips in Thriver Soup for managing chemo and radiation, Jacqui did conventional treatment. “Thriver Soup is my bible,” she said. “It is amazing and made a huge difference for me.”
Jacqui finished treatment January 12, 2018, and is free of evidence of disease. Yet she continues to read and refer to Thriver Soup, because the ideas can apply to any and every area of life.
“Everyone should read Thriver Soup, including caregivers of people diagnosed with cancer,” she says. “It can help caregivers support their loved ones by learning about complementary treatments that assist the patient. This can reduce the patients’ experience of stress.”
Jacqui spoke at the Feb. 17 HIME Wellness event at Crossroads Mason in Ohio.
I will be speaking at 10:30 am and 1 pm on Saturday at Kent Cook Institute, and at noon on Tuesday at Main Street Books, both in Davidson, NC.
On Thursday, March 1, I am the headline speaker at 2 pm at the Annie Appleseed Conference in West Palm Beach, FL.
Note: I am largely off the internet at the moment. Guests have graciously offered blog posts that I believe will be of interest. Today’s post is by Robert Cohen, the NOTMilkMan. He heard my interview on the CBS NYC station’s Bob Salter Show and called me to connect. I love his sense of humor, though this post is scientific in nature.
By Robert Cohen
There are hundreds of millions of different proteins in nature, and only one hormone that is identical between any two species. That powerful growth hormone is insulin-like growth factor, or IGF-I. IGF-I survives digestion and has been identified as the key factor in breast cancer’s growth.
Women between the ages of 25 and 65 have been successfully targeted by the marketing representatives of the dairy industry’s milk promotion board. What the dairy industry neglects to advertise is the fact that cow’s milk contains a IGF- I.
If you believe that breast feeding “works” to protect lactoferrins and immunoglobulins from digestion (and benefit the nursing infant), you must also recognize that milk is a hormonal delivery system. By drinking cow’s milk, one delivers IGF-I in a bioactive form to the body’s cells.
When IGF-I from cow’s milk alights upon an existing cancer…
“Human Insulin-like growth factor (IGF-I) and bovine IGF-I are identical. Both contain 70 amino acids in the identical sequence.”
– SCIENCE
“IGF-I is critically involved in the aberrant growth of human breast cancer cells.”
– Journal of the National Institute of Health
“Estrogen regulation of IGF-I in breast cancer cells would support the hypothesis that IGF-I has a regulatory function in breast cancer.”
– Molecular Cell Endocrinology
“IGF-I is a potent growth factor for cellular proliferation in the human breast carcinoma cell line.”
– Journal of Cellular Physiology
“Insulin-like growth factors are key factors for breast cancer growth.”
– Journal of Cellular Physiology
“IGF-I produces a 10-fold increase in RNA levels of cancer cells. IGF-I appears to be a critical component in cellular proliferation.”
– Experimental Cellular Research
“IGF-I plays a major role in human breast cancer cell growth.”
European Journal of Cancer
“IGF-I has been identified as a key factor in breast cancer.”
The Lancet
“Serum IGF-I levels increased significantly in milk drinkers, an increase of about 10% above baseline but was unchanged in the control group.”
Journal of the American Dietetic Association
“IGF-1 accelerates the growth of breast cancer cells.”
SCIENCE
“Poor absorption of lactose may more than double the risk of ovarian cancer in women.”
– American Journal of Epidemiology
“Galactose is linked both to ovarian cancer and infertility…women who consume dairy products on a regular basis, have triple the risk of ovarian cancer than other women.”
– The Lancet
“Interest in the role of the IGF axis in growth control and carcinogenesis has recently been increased by the finding of elevated serum (IGF-I) levels in association with three of the most prevalent cancers in the United States: prostate cancer, colorectal cancer, and lung cancer. IGFs serve as endocrine, autocrine, and paracrine stimulators of mitogenesis, survival, and cellular transformation.”
– Journal of Cellular Physiology
“IGF-I reacts in a synergistic manner with estrogen, and plays a role in the growth and proliferation of ovarian cancer.”
– Journal of Clinical Endocrinology
For more, please visit http://notmilk.com/drharris.html
See also http://notmilk.com/drlarsen.html
Discover 3 kick-butt keys to thriving despite cancer. Important attitudes, behaviors, and major life choices are explored in this episode of Breast Friends Cancer Support Radio network. Listen for tips on managing chemotherapy, the difference between being healed and being cured, reducing pain levels, and getting out of the hospital early. Find genuine hope and practical options to improve outcomes.
https://www.voiceamerica.com/episode/97339/3-keys-to-thriving-after-cancer
Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they toil not, neither do they spin. Even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.
Matthew 6:28-29, Christian Bible
The lilies in my neighbor Jennifer’s yard had grown so much that “on a whim” she was outside, digging up a large swathe of them. Just as my son and I were walking by—which we only do once every week or two.
Had we walked by an hour earlier or later, she would not have been working on the lilies and they would not have been available.
The timing of her whim proved perfect. She offered them to me. In time to plant for Mother’s Day.
Lilies are considered by some to symbolize motherhood. This arises from an ancient Greek myth that the goddess Hera’s milk overflowed, and the milk that fell to the earth splashed and formed white lilies.
White lilies often appear in paintings of the Madonna when being told she will bear the Christ Child, once again tying the flower to motherhood and new beginnings. This new beginning extends to restoration of innocence for the souls of the departed.
My own mother is among the departed–I lost her decades ago to breast cancer. And I lost my son Brennan less than a year ago.
These flowers aren’t the first lilies to show up near a holiday. A stylized lily, referred to as the fleur-de-lis, was on a red vase that appeared on my porch in time for Christmas—a surprise package I believe Brennan had a hand in getting delivered. Now bunches of the real deal are growing in my yard.
The connection is clear to me. I believe Brennan, and perhaps my mother as well, had something to do with my neighbor’s “whim” and the timing of my walk, so I would have lilies in his memorial garden in time for Mother’s Day. And there were enough to plant some in the front yard, adorning an area designated for my other son’s plants. I look forward to their summer glories.
Thriver Soup Ingredient
If you would like to grow lilies, here is a guide: https://www.almanac.com/plant/lilies