Here are ideas for how to transform your life in positive ways. Thriver Soup appeared on Fix it with Faust (Faust Ruggiero) Radio Show via healthylifenet. Enjoy!
Tag Archives: uterine cancer
“Be Your Authentic Self”
Hey everyone, I was interviewed on Deborrah Cooper’s Debruary 2022. My topic was
“Be Your Authentic Self.”
Deborrah writes, “Are you comfortable enough to show the world your real, your true, your authentic self, or do you hide and pretend to be what others want you to be? Heidi Bright is our Debruary 2020 guest tonight, and shares a wonderful story of perseverance, determination and survival.
“Heidi found her way to authenticity after successfully battling a terminal cancer diagnosis in 2009. She realized that being her authentic self was the greatest gift she could give both to herself and others. Learning to manage her emotions in healthy ways was, as Heidi says “a game changer.” Listen to this interview to learn strategies to get in touch with who you are, and how to honor and respect your true self.”One of the comments was “Absolutely INCREDIBLE! Outstanding interview!”
Watch it here:
tinyurl.com/4znsw5br
NED… Now What?
So you are told you are free of evidence of disease.
YIPPEEEE!!!
And…
What do you do now?
How many people are told they have no evidence of disease, only for the cancer to come roaring back months, or even years, later?
Knowing this, do you go back to living the way you did when you were diagnosed? Or do you change your life on a permanent basis to increase your chances for long-term survival?
When I struggled for 2 terrible years to get into remission, I understood that any change I made most likely needed to be permanent. I knew that the way I had been living had contributed to the development of the cancer; the logical choice was to change my life so the cancer would no longer feel at home in my body.
I know my life patterns led to the collapse of my health. They had to be changed for me to get permanently out of trouble. One aspect was my diet. Before the cancer, it was pretty good–lots of certified organic produce–but after the end-stage diagnosis I ramped it up considerably.
One permanent change was creating a daily green smoothie. Soon after the diagnosis, my brother Walter gave me a Vitamix, a high-speed blender I wanted so I could make those sludgies.After 12 years of daily use, sometimes hard use, sometimes 3-times-a-day use, my Vitamix finally gave out.
I have lived longer than my Vitamix! That is truly miraculous.
I immediately bought another machine and plan to continue using it daily for the rest of my life. Unless I outlive this one, too. Which, of course, I fully intend to do.
It’s already getting hard workouts. After only a week the pitcher has a slight fogginess to it, because my smoothies are full of minerals and vitamins. The cloudiness bears witness to all the nutrients I’m getting. Weeds in my garden are fair game. Today’s sludgie was blanched dandelion greens, stems and flowers, concord grape seeds, red clover flowers, and eggshell membranes. Not at all delicious, but that is not my goal. I aim for maximum nutrition for maximum health.
That was my goal during the cancer treatment, and everything else I did was aimed at my goal of survival. I changed every other aspect of my life to improve my chances of living. Once I had made enough changes–to everyone’s amazement–I went into radical remission.
And have stayed healthy for ten full years, receiving no treatments at all and showing no evidence of any disease.
So I am keeping these changes because I like being healthy and alive! And I am delighted to have outlived my blender.
If you are looking for guidance on how to get out of cancerland, perhaps we can work together to free you so your body can do what it does naturally–heal itself. As a Champion in Cancer Care, I can offer insights and wisdom to ease your way.
Please Contact me today for a free consultation:
513
444-0190
Perfect TEN!
Ten years ago, my CT scan showed a cancerous half-inch nodule squatting on the pulmonary vein next to my heart.
SHT.
After two years of sarcoma treatment, I had just used up my last chemotherapy option. Now what? I felt so screwed.
Five weeks later, when surgeon Patrick Ross operated, that bugger had swollen to 2.5 inches.
That’s aggressive growth.
I can’t tell from the surgical report if he even got clean margins. Who could, with such a dangerous location?
During my post-operation appointment, the nurse practitioner told me she’d seen situations like mine for thirty years. “You need to get back on chemotherapy or get ready for Hospice.”
My mouth went dry, my throat constricted, and my pulse raced. If the nurse was right, I would probably be dead within a few months.
OMG, NO… I had boys to raise and books to write and life to live.
I soon saw my psychotherapist, who witnessed and guided me as I allowed the terror to simply be in my body. Then it flipped into anger, and I stopped breathing, except for quick gasps. Finally, she returned my mind to the room. I shook and shuddered, then relaxed. My chest tingled and emotionally I felt nothing. Then I moved into peace.
Tai Chi Grandmaster Vince Lasorso later pointed out to me how easy it is to slip into feelings of hopelessness, powerlessness, emptiness, loneliness, and being forsaken. No one can face death with you—it’s a solitary assignment. A dark depression, induced by the chemicals of medicine and mind, can extinguish all faith.
“It’s during these times when one must look to the light,” he wrote. “Reliance on God can change your course at any second.”
He was right.
Despite the dire warning, I continued healing my life in every way I knew how, clearing out emotional garbage and removing what Vince called “bad thinks.” Generous and gentle people helped me every step of the way.
Ever since that terrible day in 2011, my scans have been completely free of any evidence of cancer. And I have also been completely free of all cancer treatment.
This month it’s the Perfect Ten (years)!
I find this truly miraculous, not only because of the deadly and persistent diagnosis I had, but also because I have remained healthy despite going through a divorce and losing my 19-year-old son to a heroin overdose in 2015.
Medical treatment bought me time. All the inner healing work I did, and my deepening connection with the Divine, kept me sane and safe.
I now offer what I learned through Cancer Survival Coaching. If you or someone you know would like a free initial consultation, feel free to call me at 513 444 0190.
I also will be speaking on “A Conversation with Dis-ease” at noon on Sunday, November 21, 2021 at the Body Mind Spirit Expo, Sharonville Convention Center in Cincinnati.
I look forward to connecting!
The Sun Makes Me Sing
Brood X male cicadas are vigorously singing their little tymbals out, calling in mates so the cycle of life can continue.
To me, their drone is the beautiful music of summer, having formed one of my first firm memories of warm Kansas days.
Now they represent far more to me.
Cicadas spend more than a decade underground—in the case of Brood X, a seemingly endless seventeen years in darkness and silence. Then they crawl to the surface, break 
through their shells, warm up in the sunshine, and fly with golden-tinged gossamer wings.
They live only a few weeks in the sun. During this time they crawl and fly, sing and flick, dance and mate. When they are done with their shining moments, their legacy continues in their gifts of fertilized eggs, food for songbirds, and nitrogen for forest floors.
Just like we humans who choose to transform our lives. When we have late-stage cancer, we spend a long time—sometimes more than a decade—in the Underworld. For me it’s been 12 years since my end-stage cancer diagnosis. This darkness involved two years of medical treatment, and then continued through the collapse of my marriage, multiple moves, dealing with my son Brennan’s years of drug addiction, the death of my father, and then Brennan’s overdose death at age 19.
Years of suffocating in the terrors of human Hell.
And now—a dozen years and dozens of processes later—I am finally emerging into the light. Into dancing. Into joy.
Just like the cicadas, I am spreading my own golden gossamer wings and learning how to fly. Nourishing others who also want to sing again in the light of the sun. And leaving my own legacy for future generations.
Would you like to join me? I offer cancer survival coaching for those who want to thrive and fully embrace life again. Contact me at
heidi
(at)
thriversoup.com
I look forward to talking with you!
Source for title:
Frédéric Mistral from Provençe, France, coined the phrase, “Lou soulei mi fa canta,” Provençal for “the sun makes me sing.” https://www.thenotsoinnocentsabroad.com/blog/la-cigale-why-the-cicada-became-the-symbol-of-provence
Virtual Panel on Gynecological Health Nov. 5
A medical panel of experts has come together for a virtual meeting on Thursday, November 5 at 3 pm CT.
Topics to be discussed:
- Options to treat uterine fibroids: when is surveillance acceptable
- Surgical treatment options available for women with uterine fibroids; traditional surgical hysterectomy and myomectomy (vaginally or abdominally), laparoscopic hysterectomy, and myomectomy, and laparotomy using a small incision in the abdomen
- Use of power morcellation- what you need to know
- Importance of imaging findings in guiding approach
- Importance of following up on tissue diagnosis: leiomyoma/fibroids vs presence of cancer
- Risk factors for uterine sarcoma / leiomyosarcoma
- Lessons to be learned from those experienced in treating uterine LMS
To participate, please contact Annie Achee of the National Leiomyosarcoma Foundation: annieachee@aol.com
For more info, please visit https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ORaJRVl3x9YISH6tH7jwRrwxJNzW-G0rza6kG-bR79s/edit
Discover 3 Kick-butt Keys to Thriving Despite Cancer
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
Mirror, Mirror, on the Wall, Who is the Rarest One of All?
There are about 7,000 rare human diseases. How rare is rare? In the United States, it’s when a disease affects fewer than 200,000 people.
Um, that doesn’t seem quite so rare to me. However, diseases falling into this category tend not to get research funding. Without research, conventional treatment options are few or nonexistent. That is an enormous issue for 30 million people in the United States.
Just think of what that means for those with truly rare diseases. No one is going to fund research when only a small handful of people have a particular disease.
When I speak of a small handful, I am referring, for example, to those with undifferentiated endometrial #sarcoma. I have only heard of three women besides myself who had it. I’d say that’s pretty dang rare. And mine owned the additional prefix “highly.” Read: “the most deadly.”
My tumor slides earned the privilege of a trip to an international conference.
Not the honor I wanted.
#RareDiseaseDay was Feb. 28. This short video clip is about my experience with having a rare disease.
Cincinnati’s TV station #WLWT channel 5 came to my home to do a segment on healing from a rare disease when conventional treatment runs out of options.
Watch the 1-minute show here.
Note that Thriver Soup is not my story. It’s a series of more than 250 practical tips for healing. People with everything from anxiety attacks to Parkinson’s are adopting and benefiting from the useful ideas they’re finding in its pages.
Healing from rare diseases, even terminal situations, is possible. I am living proof.
How has Thriver Soup changed your life? I’d love to hear.
Surgical Management of Uterine Smooth-muscle Tumors
Surgical management of uterine smooth-muscle tumors was addressed briefly Oct. 8 at the National Leiomyosarcoma Foundation patient symposium in St. Louis, Mo. This was one of several cancer treatment topics that I am reporting about during the coming weeks.
Matthew Anderson, associate professor and director of research (gynecology) at Baylor University, said “Uterine leiomyosarcoma is a unique disease.” As many as 80 percent of women are impacted by a uterine smooth muscle tumor. About 200,000 hysterectomies are performed every year, which costs $3 to $5 billion.
“The only way to know if it’s malignant is to surgically remove it,” he said, because there are no diagnostic markers and no blood tests that can be used to determine malignancy.
Leiomyomas can arise in unusual locations. If they are morcellated, they can create other problems down the road. These myomas tend to respond to hormonal therapy.
They generally don’t tend to respond to chemotherapy or radiation.
About 70 percent of uterine LMS are discovered as isolated uterine masses. Recurrence rates are 40 to 70 percent.
With surgical debulking, doctors can increase progression-free survival from 6.8 months to 14.2 months.
Resection of pulmonary metastases can improve disease-free survival by as long as 24 months. This can include extensive resections while preserving good functional lung status.
Surgery by itself is not the answer. Unseen cells can come back. Ultimately patients have to rely on chemotherapy.
On April 17, 2014, the US FDA issued a safety communication regarding the use of power morcellation for performing hysterectomies or myomectomies. This led manufacturers to withdraw the devices and hospitals generally are not using this method.
Impact: 99 percent of the time, the uterine tumor is not cancer. Yet demand from patients for minimally invasive hysterectomies continues.
There is one case of ULMS in every 1,960 cases.
Short-term, the risk of ULMS should be discussed thoroughly with each patient.
The long-term goal is to develop a diagnostic test that can be used to determine malignancy.
Sometimes We Need to Sweat the Small Stuff
I am responsible for his death. I never paid any attention to Black Gold’s lameness; he always 
seemed to work out of it.
H. Webb, trainer, in the fiction book Black Gold
A hairline crack developed in the hoof wall of the Thoroughbred Black Gold as he raced through the spring of his three-year-old season. Despite the soreness this created, he won the 1924 Kentucky Derby. His trainer kept pushing the stallion anyway, and the jockey, Jaydee Mooney, stopped riding the lame horse in protest. The injury was left untreated and worsened. Eventually the brave racehorse broke that limb during a race, finishing on three legs. The beloved racehorse was put down.
I read his story, by Marguerite Henry, when I was in grade school. While very sad, I loved the tale. This year I found the same hardback book for $1 and brought it home to reread.
The parallels with my life were too obvious. I didn’t give much heed to the “benign” fibroid in my gut that grew unreasonably large. Two good friends found it frightening and urged me to get to a doctor as soon as possible.
By this time I was out of town. Through a long process, I finally decided to go to the emergency room. A small problem, like Black Gold’s hoof crack, left unattended, became deadly–a stage 4 uterine sarcoma.
It’s easy in our culture, with our “grin-and-bear-it,” “no pain, no gain” athletic mentality, to ignore our bodies’ warning signs. Yet our bodies give these signals because something is out of balance and needs our attention. Small problems, if attended to quickly, can stay small and be fixed, or at least controlled. Left on their own, they can become insurmountable issues.
Thriver Soup Ingredient
One fallout from a cancer diagnosis is that every headache, skin bump, or new pain brings up anxiety around the idea that it could be cancerous. If the symptom persists, it might be a good idea to get it checked by a doctor.
Sources:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Hof9.gif
Marguerite Henry, Black Gold (Rand McNally, 1975)