I realised pretty quickly that it was not just me that had a diagnosis it was everyone that loved and cared about me. This was a pretty grim realisation, particularly when it came to close relationships. “I have cancer” is not an easy sentence, it doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue. It’s hard to look an 11 year old in the eye and explain your health status honestly with those words, without coming across as dramatic and doom laden. So I fumbled my way through it, trying to hold onto hope and positive statistics, while being honest that treatment would be tough.”I would loose my hair, blah, blah and have to have more surgery blah, blah”, kind of thing, definitely a spectacular low point.
Surprisingly it was also painful telling close friends and even my ex-husband, the shock in everyone was palpable, some people hugged me, others burst into tears it was a very weird thing. I felt genuinely embarrassed. I found myself making flippant remarks, that were frequently in poor taste and often upset people. I didn’t seem capable of anything approaching tact or sensitivity. I had to accept there was no right or wrong way of being ill and there were no guarantees. No Doctor says, “it’s all going to be fine”, they say “we think it will be, but we cannot commit to you being cured or to you dying, as we just don’t know. Statistically you stand a good chance etc.” Their uncertainty was disarming, it’s not what I expected of scientists. Cancer upsets all those long held opinions, that you didn’t know you had, but secretly underpin your entire psyche. A Doctor not knowing anything felt philosophically challenging.
So the Doctors may have been reluctant to commit one way or the other, the same however cannot be said for some people in the green juicing community. Let me just be clear, I have a lot of respect for organic farming and clean eating and all those things. If anyone with cancer decides they want to try and cure themselves via this route then all power too them. I respect anyone’s right to choose. As I mentioned in my day one statement, shared on the Breast Cancer Haven website, I felt a lot of pressure not to have chemotherapy from people within my community. A lot of people who didn’t have cancer, felt at liberty to tell me that I would be permanently damaging myself if I did. It was all a pharmaceutical con to make money, apparently.
That is when the inflexibility of the alternative medical world hit me really hard and I had to let go of needing the approval of some of my friends. It was all horrible co-dependent neediness on my part anyway, I just wanted to do cancer ‘right’. However in my heart of hearts I knew that I needed chemotherapy to survive, I just felt it. The Haven helped me see that you could combine conventional treatment with complimentary therapies. It wasn’t a case of either or, there was a sweet spot in the middle, where all options were open.
I had to learn pretty quickly to deflect the well intentioned advice and judgements of other people, people who had no idea what it was like to stand in my shoes. My cancer was caused by my thinking the wrong thoughts and drawing the dis-ease towards myself, with my inherently negative attitude. Ah, okay I would think, unable to take on the crappiness of what was being said to me. The truth is cancer has changed me. In some ways very much for the better, so to assume that it’s a massive negative is to ignore the expansion that comes with the challenge that can kill. Life is not a risk free proposition too, cancer merely reflects our mortality back at us, it did not make us mortal in the first place.
So from this place of humanity I read a book (pictured above) that really helped me unpick my choices and take an integrative approach to my treatment and well being. I liked this book because it didn’t say it would cure me. It didn’t say, don’t have chemotherapy or radiotherapy. It said, cancer was a difficult foe, which just felt like the truth. I would recommend the ‘Anti Cancer Diet’ book, even if you don’t have cancer. It is written by a brilliant Doctor who actually fought brain cancer and had treatment himself. If you get the chance, it’s well worth a read. Like anything it’s not perfect, but there is a lot of value to the approach he outlines, even if cancer killed him in the end. He did so well to live 19 years after his diagnosis and to have contributed so much to the world. Here is a link to a basic overview of his ideas.
*This blog is written to support #Breast Cancer Awareness Month and the Breast Cancer Haven who helped me beat beast cancer in 2008 and in 2011 – along with the incredible team on Worthing Hospital’s Breast Cancer Ward. I am blessed to be well today.
Donate to the Breast Cancer Haven Here
Eugenie Arrowsmith 