natural girls
Comments
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Hi, Lili: I am going to have that urine element profile done in January, and I already started taking NAC.
Springtime, let us know when you find out some more?
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Vivre, how wonderful that you have such an accomplished ND. Is he trained to do both dry and wet cupping? Wet Cupping, which I am interested in, is used to remove old, stagnant blood just below the surface of the skin while bloodletting is accomplished venously. From the videos I saw, the blood that is removed is thick and viscous, almost clotted, which they say is filled with toxins from, smoking, pesticides, cholesterol, medications, etc.
I did not know that blood donation was possible with a bc dx but according to Sloan-Kettering you can donate as long as you are not in treatment and have been in remission for 2 years. http://www.mskcc.org/mskcc/html/12746.cfm
Here is info on iron overload and donating blood:
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Efflorescing: What? So breast cancer patients can donate blood? That's a big surprise.....0
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Yep, that's what they say. I thought it was a no, no. Go figure! They will probably find out years from now that it was not such a good idea.
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Do any of you know anything about MACA, the peruvian herb that is supposed to help naturally balance your hormones, and get rid of many menopausal symptoms, as well as increase your energy? Can any of you who go to Naturopathic doctors ask them what they think about it? For obvious reasons, it's not something I'd even bother asking my Onc about.
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Is anyone familiar with Jujube fruit? I bought a bag of it dried at a Certified Farmers Market on Saturday. I'd never heard of it, and It's unlike anything else I've every had -- really delicious, and it's supposed to have a lot of health benefits:
http://www.ehow.com/about_5336695_health-benefits-jujube-fruit.html
I'll be @ UCLA tomorrow getting my new nipple! Thankfully, my PS does this step under local anesthetic, so it shouldn't be any big deal, except that it should be the last surgical procedure I'll need, so in that regard, it is a big deal! Deanna
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I have been reading the natural girls boards for awhile, with only occasional comments. However, I think this idea of "cupping" and blood letting is so absurd that I cannot let it go.
Lets go back to the medical understanding of ancient greeks and forget about any advances in medicine. Lets do blood letting and cupping to balance the four "humors" in the body: blood, phlegm, yellow bile and black bile. Even in ancient Middle Eastern texts it says, "Whoever performs cupping on the 17th, 19th or 21st day (of the lunar month) then it is a cure for every disease" . We even have t do it on the right days!
Wow, lets do cupping and blood letting. Lets resurrect the original meaning of the barber pole! An easier way to do the same thing is what the barbers did to extract toxic blood. You attach leeches to your skin, and when they are nice and fat remove them with the "toxic blood"
There are natural methods, and there are absurd methods. IMO, this is absurd. I am not a troll, but I do use my head in deciding treatments.
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I woke up this morning to a winter wonderland....Philadelphia had 23.2 inches of snow in this storm. Since I had no where in particular to go, I had a wonderful day of cooking healthy, vegetarian "comfort food" and enjoying the beauty of the snow.
And on that note, I want to take the time to wish all of you a wonderful holiday season and a new year of health, happiness, and peace.
Hugs to all of you.
- Mandy
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Wishing you well Deanna! Please keep us posted and I'm sure you will have beautiful results.
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Deanna - wishing you the best today! Keep us posted!
Mandy - Sounds like a nice day! Happy holidays to you and all of the natural girls!
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Good morning ladies,
Deanne-Good luck to you. Sending healing light your way, please keep us posted
. I can't wait until ALL my procedures are over with. Mandy, WOW, I bet the snow IS beautiful, I love snow(don't see much of it here in Texas). Happy Holidays and peace to you as well.
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Motheroffoursons, one of the great privileges of a free society is the right to choose. Your opinion is yours and has no bearing on the truth. I would however advise you that your quoting of religious texts, especially when it is not your religion, could be considered as derision and mockery. I hope that is not your intention.
It is possible that I don't understand the meaning of Troll. A partial definition on Wiki states that the Troll has the intention of provoking an emotional response. Outside of this board my position is to try to ignore the ignorant but some situations demand a response. Your post is one of them.
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Deanna: wishing you well today (and every day).
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Efflorescing,
I intentionally left out any mention of any religion. I have lived most of my life in the Middle East and am senstivie to that. I did not want to offend in that area.
All cultures and therefore religions have medical practices from ancient writings that are spurious, especially interpretations thereof. Fro instance, in the Bible Rachel and Leah fought over a mandrake plant that was thought to help conception for barren women.
That is not to denigrate the spiritual truths of ancient writings.
Another example is that in the middle ages the cure for hepatitis (Doctors treatment) was to go to the town square and drink urine from the public urinal. Since with hepatitis the patients urine turns dark, it was thought that drinking the urine would "flush out" the dark, unhealthy urine. It worked as people with hepatitis more often than not recover on their own. It was a case of correlation without causation.
I like natural treatments, supplements, caring for your health, etc. However, in deciding on natural treatments just because some treatment has been practiced for centuries, does not make it valid.
For instance, I recognize acupuncture for pain treatment and treatment of chemo nausea has been shown to be valid. Great, However the hormone balance thing with acupunture I still question.
However, in wet cupping, which is bleeding, there is not any established benefit. being natural does not mean forgetting to use common sense, falling for every cure, and failing to do some research.
Feeling that some "natural cure" (Aside: How natural is wet cupping?) is bogus and questioining its validity does not make me a troll. It makes me a thoughtful natural girl.
Salaam Alaikum
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Deanna: Good luck with your procedure.
Mandy: I love snow, but this time, the winter wonderland thing does not work for me:
Had to reschedule multiple flights......While waiting, I'll do the same thing you are doing: cooking healthy. Dah.0 -
Motheroffour, you may want to read up a bit before you dismiss or mock a topic we discuss. My husband gets blood taken about twice a year as recommended by his medical doctor. Also, if you do a bit of research or listen to TV, you would see that medical leeches have been rediscovered. You can check the National Library of Medicine database or even google the subject. Also, a few years ago, a major network did a report on the revival of medical leeches.
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Good luck today Deanna. May you never have to have another surgery! God bless.
For all you snowed in girls-welcome to my world. Actually, we only had a couple of inches this time, but I love the fact that we will have a beautiful white christmas. I love walking in the snow. It is so peaceful and quiet. When I was out yesterday I was trying to decide if it is healthier when we walk in the cold or the heat? I know we burn more calories trying to stay warm, but we sweat when it is hot our. So I guess that is the trade off.
Momof4-You know we like to explore all kinds of topics here. The point is not to tell others what to do, but to share thoughts and information. My opinion is that if we try it, sometimes that is the best way to determine wheter or not it works. There does not have to be any either/or. That is why I do not fault those who choose to use drugs. For some people they are their answer. For me, I like to keep learning new things and giving them a try. The book I read(Survival of the Sickest, by Dr. Sharon Moalem), did
quite an extensive chapter about the build up of iron in our bodies and how it affects our health. It was published in 2007, so it is not exactly old news. The doctor/author is a researcher who has also found a link to alheimer's and is dedicating his life to studying disease. He is not exactly a lightweight. As for my ND, he spent 3 years studying oriental medicine in Japan. So I am very interested in his integral approach to wellness. I do not see anything wrong with us exploring all the avenues out there. I think the great thing about our group is that we can try different things and then share our experiences with each other. Experience is the best teacher after all. I am happy that you are reading our thread, and I hope that some of the things we are saying have been helpful to you. We never profess to have all the answer, nor do we try to coerce others to try our ways, not like some of the threads around here who pounce on people who do not agree. We are all about having the right to personal choice around here.
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About giving blood-Is there a reason why they do not take bc survivors? I was all set to give it a try. The leeches do not sound like something I would ever be able to deal with, and the cupping thing is just not my cup of tea(pun intended). Is it because they thing we may still have cancer cells in our blood? Well, isn't it true that we all have cancer cells in our bodies, and it is up to our immune systems to knock them out before they can grow? I know my immune system is firing on all burners right now.
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I don't think anyone is doubting the role of medicacl leeches. I know people who have had them used to save a breast flap. And medical phlebotomy for hemachromatosis or polycythemia is standard of care. That's not the same as "blood-letting" for feeling toxic.
I am curious, though, how blood-letting when you're already anemic will improve things. Physiologically, I mean. When you're volume-depleted or iron-depleted, losing more blood just compounds the problems, no? Seriously, I mean NO disrespect to anyone's opinions, I'm just trying to make sense of this.
A great book about the Lao culture and cupping is "The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down."
Many of us who read this thread regularly and post occasionally DO use our own blend of traditional and nontraditional therapy. That's what integrative medicine is all about. We come here because we know there is some good information that we can incorporate into our daily lives, even though we may not buy in to everything. Please don't yell at us when we question something. We DO read and do our research, same as you, and then use our value system to form a judgment, same as you. It just may not be the same conclusion. Doesn't make you or me a troll.
Someone will surely disagree with me for the sake of disagreeing. That's okay.
Anne
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Anne, I am not sure what your comment is intended to say. The problem for me with Mom4's post was not that she disagreed with us, but that she seemed to do so in a demeaning manor. It seems to me that that is when we get upset with people. We do not expect everyone to agree with us, but we sure do get upset when people do so with an attitude.
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When I had my first surgery I became anemic and the doc told me is was because I lost blood during the surgery. I have used iron to get my levels back up.
Just an FYI. Just before I had my recurrence, I had complete blood panels done and nothing showed up screwy, yet I had a tumor in my arm pit. This actually makes me leery of receiving blood if ever need be. How do we know we would not received cancer cells. Scary thought.
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Does anybody know about this? I assumed once diagnosed with Breast Cancer, we could no longer donate our organs? (On drivers license here, for instance). That is the same with Blood then??
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Good luck Deanna, today is quite a milestone!!
..I was called by the red cross to donate blood back when I was first dx and I told them I had BC and the doctor suspects I had it four two years (I had donated once within the time span) and they about flipped out over the phone. Nobody called me back to let me know what was what, I just know that the person who I spoke with got all upset about how I had donated cancer blood unknowingly.
- I think it is ok to disagree with ppl. Its done on all of the other threads, I think mom of four was a little put off by this strange ancient technique - it is strange by way of todays care. I also am having a hard time understanding this. I read up on it. The first site brought me to a weird satanic website or something. Then, I dug around and found that its an ayruvedic technique to cleanse the body of toxins. But re conventional meds, its used for iron issues. The part I don't understand is that if you have iron issues, it's going to be throughout your entire body, not just the part that they bloodlet - so I ask, what is the chemistry- is iron attracted to oxygen? The idea of having an infection and letting it bleed out is interesting.
oh yeah, caught up with the nats girls thread and saw a comment about the baking soda therapy- I never said bsoda was an acid. not sure if that was directed to me???
loving the snow, i cannot believe philly got over two feet - craziness!
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And Deanna: I forgot to mention that I have eaten a whole lot of jujube fruits as a child,
as I lived in countries where it is sold in the street for like 3 cents/3 fistfuls or so. DELICIOUS, indeed, and very healthy.
Sometimes, I wonder if having grown up on jujubes and all of the following as a child, may still be helping me out through this breast cancer
journey (if you cannot open these links, you can find all of these things by googling the name of each fruit, followed by the word "pictures"):
sugar apple:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=sugar+apple&aq=f&oq=&aqi=g10 (tastes almost like honey with texture, best description I have)
Saba Senegalensis (this is the botanical name of it, perhaps this fruit originated in Senegal, I just don't know):
I know, I know. Doesn't look good. But delicious, and very healthy
Cashew fruit (not the nut):
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=cashew+fruit&aq=f&oq=&aqi=g10
Nere fruit (tastes almost like sweet powdered milk, just much, much, much healthier):
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=Nere+fruit+pictures&btnG=Search&aq=f&oq=&aqi=
.....And fruit juices such as sorrel juice, a big hit in the carribbean, where it is consumed all day long in certain places:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=sorrel+juice&btnG=Search&aq=0&oq=Sorrel++jui&aqi=g2g-m1
All these are choke full of antioxidants, many of which have not yet been tackled by American research, but have been the object of increasing interest
by French, British, Italian, and Brazilian research among others.
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Anyone know if Ginko in safe for ER+ women?
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Hi Ladies,
Thank you Yazmin for the sites
very interesting. I'm going to have to look more into this JuJube fruit.
Merilee- My Aunt is ER+ and she has been taking Ginko for a looonnnggg time and her Onco told her that she did not see any reason for her to stop taking it.
Jenny.
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Jazmin, thank you for educating us. I didn't know jujubes were an actual fruit. I thought they were a kind of candy they sold in the movies.
I need to get to more exotic markets and check out the fruits there. Thanks!
>
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Yes, Ladies. I suspect you will love many of those fruits. I can assure you that they are absolutely delicious.
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Anom, the kind in movies is the only kind I've had!
I remember my eyes popping out when I learned about medical leaches! You just never know. Everybody has to research and do what is right for them. Some of us here are encouraged by our Neutropaths/Docs to do Vit C drips, and I bet that is weird sounding for others. It is still weird sounding to me, and I have done one!
I think we are all trail blazers. There is no guidance out there, or little, through this. God help us all!
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Does anyone remember where Resveratrol was recently discussed? Was it on the natural girls thread or somewhere else? I don't see a dedicated thread to this topic. Just wondering if anyone remembers.
Thanks!
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