natural girls
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Caroline ~ Have you read Beating Cancer With Nutrition, by Patrick Quillin, PhD, RD, CNS, and a former VP for the Cancer Treatment Centers of America? He has an entire chapter entitled, Sugar Feeds Cancer, with abundant research references.
I also just got ahold of a brand new book by Keith Block, the integrative doctor vivre has mentioned. It's called LIFE OVER CANCER, and it looks like it's an absolute goldmine of the kind of integrative information those of us here are after. I just happen to get ahold of an advance reading copy, but it looks like it's supposed to be available this month. Here's Dr. Block's website so that you can look into it if you're interested: http://www.blockmd.com/ Deanna
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Lisa great input . In my case I am sure it was the years on the bcpill combined with an unhealthy weight gain last 2 years and don't forget stress added. This is a great thread have learned alot and bought all the books.Thanks ladies.
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Thanks Deanna, I will look into this book. I already have a few from the librairy to read so I added that one to the list.
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Deanna, I just ordered BOTH of those books on Amazon! Got free shipping and a good discount.
Thank you !
Great info in this thread!!!
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Hi again ladies!
By the way, have I told you all how much I looooove this thread?
So much info, and I have to catch up big time. Anyways, I bought myself some Japanese Green tea Matcha. Now, I'm not a big fan of the taste with green tea. I have to sort of force it. But was wondering if any of you have tried mixing it with anything else? This is also my first time using it. So any tips and how often should I consume it.?
TYIA....
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lexislove - I bought some Japanese green tea recently, but it was already mixed with some "twig" tea, so it is actually not bad. I would try mixing yours with a more neutral tasting tea--just a little at first until you get it to the right consistency. The tea mine is mixed with is called bancha tea, I believe. You can get it in the health food store.
Janet
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Ladies, so amazing all the post.
Welcome Stacey, so glad to hear from you!
Vivre, thanks for the encouragement!!!!! I started a happy thankful cry when I read your post. I read briefly the info you gave and will definetly reread. so Many toxins....my heart feels heavy thinking about it.
Cebula, I understand your concern about tamoxifen....I was strongly ER+, even tried it for 3 months. but had too many side effects. It does boggle your brains to fathom your onc wanting you on it for so little ER in your path report.
I see my Onc. tomorrow...I really an numb about seeing him....my last talk with him was when I decided not to cont., TAMOXifen...My liver enzymes were elevated and he told me to follow up with my family doctor....so I thought he didn't want to see me again...then I got this postcard with a follow up appt...but I see my breast surgeon every 6 months so maybe if the Onc wants to see me every 6 months, then I will be followed every 3 months...but I don't want to take anymore drugs....I hope the visit goes well.
Deanna thanks for the sugar info and book info!!
A Toast! To "Natural Girls"
Amber
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Green tea is yucky! ha! I'm tried but just can't get it down. I'm ER positive - what other flavors of tea can I safely add to it to make it taste better ? Is anyone taking green tea tablets? What brands are pure? Thanks
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Rose ~ I just started taking a green tea supplement on the advice of my PCP, who urged me to get a "good brand" -- not necessarily the most expensive one, but to be sure it was good quality. The one I chose is by Paradise Herbs and it's 100% organic & vegetarian. The label says it's 40% polyphenols, which is the good stuff. Deanna
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I prefer to get the vitamins we need from food rather than jumping into taking supplements where you have to guess/calculate the dosage--wonder if someone else got it right, especially where some of this is not really tested much. I actually like green tea--didn't so much at first. I did have some that had other things in it which was good--I think Tazo tea made it and one other ingredient was lemongrass. I do however need to calculate how much of the B vitamins they suggest and would consider a supplement if needed but I want to meet with a nutritionist first.
Another great book on food and other things re: cancer is Anti-Cancer: A New Way of Life by David Servan-Schreiber. It's excellent. Also I just got Waking the Warrior Goddess by Christine Horner which talks about using better diet to lower cancer risks also.
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Lisa and other ladies,
I am back to Lisa's article on the previous page about the B vitamins.
- * 200-400 mcg. Folic acid (no more)
* up to 30 mg. PABA (no more)
* at least 25 mg. B-6 (no more than 50 mg.)
* 500 mg. Inositol
* 1,000 mg. Choline*
Check on the Inositol and Choline.
Firstly, I found out I was taking too much Folic acid. Good to know! So just sticking to what is in my multi.
Second, I can't get those amounts of PABA or B6 without overdoing either the PABA or the Folic acid (if I look at B complex).
I am thinking of just ordering some B6 and trying to "eat" the PABA. lol.
Any thoughts appreciated. Also, how are the rest of you balancing your B vits?
Deanna, I am also now taking a green tea extract. I will look up your version. I got mine at Super Wal-mart, so 'nough said about THAT!!!
Is anybody taking Grape seed complex or extract? I have some sitting here on my desk...
AllieM, I have been told the same thing about "eating" your vitamins and such....
Spring....
0 - * 200-400 mcg. Folic acid (no more)
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Oh love the book , Anti-Cancer, check with it a lot.
I often throw another tea bag like a black tea in with my Green for flavor. I hope that is not negating the good stuff? Anybody know?Spring.
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I do take grapeseed extract and I use the oil on my skin. It feels so soft!
Rose-great to see you here. Green tea does take some getting use to. I use to not like it too, but now I love it. Start out by mixing it with black teas or a flavored tea you like. I have a great tea shoppe near me that has wonderful blends of all kinds of teas. It is so much fun to try all the different flavors. I do not take tea supplements because I probably drink 6 or more cups per day. I learned something very interesting from the tea shoppe owner. She said that green tea can be resteeped, not like black teas which get bitter if you do. She said that when you reuse green tea leaves again, you end up with naturally decaffinated tea, since that is how they make decaf. So I use the first brewing in the morning, and again later in the day, so I am getting decaf.
Allie-while I agree with you that everything we consume is better in food and drinks rather than in supplements, it is really hard to get all that we need in food. Dr. Ray Strand, in his book "What your Doctor does not know about Nutrition May be Killing you", has a great chart about how much you would need in order to get enough nutrients every day. I lent the book to a friend, so I can't site it, but I remember that it said something like 20 avocados to get enough omega 3. This book is a great read, and one that really helped me to understand the value of diet and good health.
Cebula-we had a rather long thread going about sugar and cancer. You might want to look for it. It had lots of good links to studies. Basically, sugar adds to weight gain, and the more fat we have, the more our bodies produce estrogen.
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What is the reason not to take more than 400 mcg of folic acid? I missed it.
Janet
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Thank you, Amber, for recommending this thread to me. I love it! So much good info. I only scanned through the 16 pages, but know that I will most likely go back to them again and again.
My background: Diagnosed in October 2007, and jumped right into chemo just weeks later (it was a very aggressive cancer). Lumpectomy in March, followed by the 5 weeks of rads. I exercised through the whole thing, but since I have always worked out a lot, I figured I was just continuing my normal activities, as instructed. I have also don't eat any meat (except fish), and religiously take supplements.
Moderation is normally my mantra, but during all my treatment, I was more radical with my diet. No sugar (not even natural sugars or fruit), no dairy, very little grains, eat raw when possible, extra supplements. My oncologist actually told me to stay away from vegies because of bacteria (when raw) and too many antioxidants (!) which he said would work against the chemo. I felt that this was illogical, did some research which confirmed my thoughts, and then I ignored him. I never told him that I was eating all those vegies and taking tons of antioxidants supplements. I sailed through all the treatments with ease, never missed a workout and at each appointment, the doctor raved over how well my cancer was responding to the chemo. By the end of 8 rounds of chemo, my 2cm tumor had shrunk to the size of a grain of sand, and my formerly cancer-riddled lymph node was completely cancer free.
I believe that it is impossible to get all the nutrients we need just from the food we eat. Unless you are 6 feet tall and therefore can eat 3000 calories a day, it would be very difficult. That being said, I try to eat as healthy as possible - without being too radical about it.
So glad I've found you all.
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I am also weak ER+ and the hospital told me not to take Tamoxifen because in my case is not helping. My onc still wants me to think about it. I already said no. Here are a few articles but there are too many to post.
http://jnci.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/reprint/jnci;97/17/1254.pdf
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http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/cancer-causes/CA00085
Cancer causes: Popular myths about the causes of cancer.
Misconceptions about cancer causes can lead to unnecessary worry about your health. Scary e-mails circulating on the Internet claim everyday objects, such as plastic and deodorant, are secret cancer causes. Beyond being wrong, many of the myths passed on through forwarded e-mails may cause you to worry unnecessarily about your own health and the health of your family. Before you panic, take a look at the facts. Here, Timothy Moynihan, M.D., a cancer specialist at Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minn., takes a closer look at some popular myths about cancer causes and explains why they just aren't true.
People with cancer shouldn't eat sugar, since it can cause cancer to grow faster. Sugar doesn't make cancer grow faster. All cells, including cancer cells, depend on blood sugar (glucose) for energy. But giving more sugar to cancer cells doesn't speed their growth. Likewise, depriving cancer cells of sugar doesn't slow their growth. This misconception may be based in part on a misunderstanding of positron emission tomography (PET) scans. Doctors use PET scans to help determine the location of a tumor and see if it has spread. During a PET scan, your doctor injects a small amount of radioactive tracer - typically a form of glucose - into your body. All tissues in your body absorb some of this tracer. But tissues that are using more energy - exhibiting increased metabolic activity - absorb greater amounts. Tumors are often more metabolically active than are healthy tissues. As a result, they may absorb greater amounts of the tracer. For this reason, some people have concluded that cancer cells grow faster on sugar. But this isn't true.
There is more in the original article. This article is from Mayo clinic.
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Janet, those B vit ranges were from an article posted on the page before here. I think B vits are water soluable, so it would seem, like C, we'd just pee out what we don't need?
SimVog, I believe HRT is different from Tamoxifen or AI. (article above). I believe it is agreed it clearly increases breast cancer risk. I have a friend having troublesome menopausal symptoms and fillled a HRT perscription and I have begged her NOT to take it!!! :O
Spring.
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OMg...
I can't keep up with you ladies...
SPRING..I love the new pic! Short hair suites you!
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The article is too long to post. Here is the first page and the link.
http://www.all-natural.com/tamox.html
Natural Health and Longevity Resource Center
Tamoxifen
A Major Medical Mistake?
by Sherrill Sellman
Extracted from Nexus Magazine, Volume 5, #4 (June - July 1998)
Once praised for its benefits in preventing breast cancer recurrence,
the lucrative pharmaceutical drug tamoxifen is now implicated in
causing dangerous side-effects, including other types of cancers.
In the early 1970's, a shameful chapter closed on the widespread use of a known
carcinogenic and endocrine-disrupting drug called DES (diethylstilboestrol), the first
synthetic, non-steroidal estrogen drug. Against the advice of its creator, Sir Charles Dodd,
between four and six million American and European women and 10,000 Australian
women innocently used DES for the prevention of miscarriage and pregnancy
complications.
In addition, DES became a popular though unproven drug for a variety of other conditions.
It was used for the suppression of lactation, the treatment of acne, the treatment of certain
types of breast and prostatic cancer, and as an inhibitor of growth in young girls, an
estrogen replacement in menopause and a "morning after" pill.
It would take 30 years to accept what laboratory tests had indicated as early as 1938 -
that DES was a highly dangerous and harmful drug. It was reported that, 20 years after
taking DES, mothers had a 40 to 50 per cent greater risk of breast cancer than nonexposed
mothers. In addition, the children of DES mothers showed a high incidence of
reproductive abnormalities, miscarriages, vaginal cancer, testicular cancer, sterility and
immune dysfunction. In fact, it is feared that repercussions of this drug will be felt for
generations to come.
The irony of this entire debacle is that the medical establishment finally acknowledged that
DES was useless in preventing miscarriages. Thus, DES, another disastrous experiment
on women, was added to the long list of major medical blunders.
Out of this early research, a new drug appeared on the horizon which would be soon be
heralded as a shining star in the war against the growing epidemic of breast cancer. In the
late 1960's the pharmaceutical industry developed a drug called "tamoxifen". As a
synthetic, non-steroidal compound with hormone-like effects (many of which are poorly
understood), tamoxifen has a similar structure to DES. In fact, it was observed that
tamoxifen caused the same abnormal changes seen in cells of women taking estradiol and
DES. (1) This similarity raised alarm bells for some.
Pierre Blais, well known as a drug researcher who was ejected from Canada's health
protection bureaucracy when he spoke out about silicone breast implants, describes the
story of tamoxifen as "the story of modern drug design which produces garbage drugs".
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Springtime thank you. Posted the wrong links. I removed them.
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lots to read here!!!I can't keep up either, Lexilove!! (trying to get used to the short hair!)
SIM, what is a "mosaic tumor"? Or shoudl I PM you about this.... :O trying not to be a rule breaker!!!
Spring.
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Springtime
The tumor is made up of tissue with different characteristics as opposed to tissue made up of homogenous components. I had 4 biopsies done on the tumor and all came back with different results. The only constant was HER which was negative. I had ER+ 90% as well as triple negative results. Out of 4 biopsies, only one came with weak PR+. So overall it was been decided that I am weak ER/PR+,HER-. It looks like a mosaic of tissues each with their own signatures as opposed to only one. It was kind of a shock after mastectomy when the results came as triple negative after the core biopsy said ER+ 90%. So I had 2 more biopsies done.
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Hi ladies,
I'm still around but can barely keep up with the posts.
vivre, I too am so relieved that we are sans trolls right now. It was getting mighty tiresome there for a while. I really like the total toxic load article you posted. The number of new chemicals hitting the market every year is staggering. There are tens of thousands of them in our everyday products and only a handful have been studied for toxic effects, and that's just individually. It makes you wonder how anyone could possibly be cancerfree when you start learning about it all.
cebula, welcome to the thread. I think you're wise to question the benefit you'd get from tamoxifen. Side effects of tamoxifen can be: blood clots, uterine cancer, cataracts, .... I think there's a longer list than that. I remember reading that while uterine cancer is uncommon (like 1%), it was determined along the way that after 5 years tamoxifen was more harmful than helpful because of the increased incidence of uterine cancer. I'm no scientist, but does anyone who IS a scientist question the level of harm from day ONE? Considering that the 'triple negative' ladies don't take any horomone therapy at all, I'd be wondering where I really sit if my results were only 10% er+.
Also, whoever started us talking about coconut oil, thank you! I've been using coconut oil on my skin for a few weeks now and I really like it. Speaking of all those chemicals in everyday products, a lot of them are in skin lotions. Mineral oil is a petroleum product. Fragrance is nearly always a chemical. Even unscented products can have 'parfum' in it to remove the smell of something else! I aim to have a household that is as chemical-free as possible.
Spring, in your search for B vitamins, consider getting sublingual ones. They're usually liquid, and they are absorbed by holding them under your tongue for 30 seconds. For B12 especially, it can be a better way to acquire these important vitamins because the intestinal tract isn't always up to the task for various reasons. Advanced age is one reason, so make sure your elderly loved ones are getting their B vitamin levels checked.
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Munchy, glad you are here!! I aggree, we can't get all the nutrients in diet alone, and supplements help!
Vivre, I found some grapeseed oil, "Spectrum", brand name, how do you take it, spoonfuls? how much? what recipes?
I went for my follow-up onc appt today....and I feel really great about the appt and exam....my oncologist gave me one of those looks of understanding....then asked me if there was a chance that I would try the tamoxifen again....i told him "no", but he seemed to already know my answer....and told me that i was probably cured of the cancer, and that if I did have a recurrence, then tamoxifen would be an option....I am so thankful for my oncologist....I had researched and found articles stating just what he said, that sometimes with early stage bc that tamoxifen could be opted out of and if recurrence occurred then it could be utilized. This is most reassuring....now I will be examined every 3 months for a while.....by my onc every 6 months and then my breast surgeon every 6 months.
Last night I was concerned about water sources.....so I researched what is the best water to drink....every answer was not a great answer....as far as distilled water goes you do not get the minerals and unless you have a distiller you purchase it in plastic containers. It also detoxies your body and shouldn;t be used during fasting for any length of time...then water bottles have potential side effects, tap water/municipal water has chlorines and dioxins....and if you drink at resturaunts etc....it is probably municipal water....so it make me want to give up....I was buying "Land O lake" gallon jug water....but then I am not sure of the containers..
Until I was 14, I drank mostly well water.....I don't remember much plastic ware, except occasional 2 liter colas my mom got. But my grandmother had well water most of her life.....healthy and no cancer...
If anyone will share good water source notes or best filters, I did read that charcoal filters give a more alkaline water. I tried a "pur", 2 different kinds and I had problems getting them to work properly.
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Hi Vivre !! I pmed you yesterday.
Ladies what are you thoughts on Stevia ? My naturapath suggested I use it in my green tea that it didn't affect blood sugar levels.
Also, she was telling me about fermented soy. She knows I'm avoiding soy but she said that fermented soy wouldn't hurt. Anyone eat fermented soy - which would be miso or Tempeh.
I'm so glad we have this thread!!
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My naturapath said the same thing about Stevia.
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I am using Truvia which i find at Krogers and Publix. It is a form of stevia.
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Lisa. ... or whoever...:)
... what can you ladies tell us about Truvia. My dh uses this as he says it is the only thing sweet enough for him. My Stevia is not enough. 0 -
Rose and Laura, I also use Stevia, I find it in little packets at Wal-Mart (of all places!) but this year I'm also growing it on the deck! I also use Agave Nectar as a sugar/honey/maple syrup substitute. Stevia and Agave sweeten but don't give you the insulin spike of a sugar or honey or syrup. (At least, this is what the Anti-Cancer, A New Way of Life book says!) I am used to both of them now and even bake with Agave! It works just fine.Very happy to be mostly sugar free, except for the occasional 1 square of dark dark chocolate I have. I figure the benefit must outweigh the sugar, as this was also "allowed" in the Anti-Cancer book!
Deanna, my "Life Over Cancer" book is in the mail! I can't wait to see what it's like. Did anyone else start it yet?
Laura, how did you find a naturapath? I think I need one of those... I need someone to help me with all this vitamin stuff I think.And the non-medical aspect of all of this... I feel like I am doing okay, but I'd feel better with a bit of guidance . Thank God we have each other though! I find this thread so helpful.
Lisa - I ordered DIM vs. IC3! (another helpful hint!)
Sim, I think I may have had one of those tumors you describe, is why I asked, I was 90%ER 90%PR for biopsy then after chemo/surgery, I was 90%ER but 0% PR!!! I imagine different things were cooking in there. All gone now!! But it is odd, huh? You would assume the thing would all be the same. Interesting...
Amber, I think you are cured too! Teeny tumor, no nodes, grade 2, pooh. You be done!
Althea, I almost tried a sublingual one, but the reviews on it were horrible. apparently it tasted so bad people could not use it! (Did you ever hear that, or are they typically okay?) It scared me and I ordered pills. Maybe I'll try to learn more about this sublinqual and search for a brand that is well tolerated!
Spring.
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