Did you stop alcohol drinking?
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I have enjoyed reading all your posts. I'd say I drank a lot b4 Dx...I worked for a high-stress construction company, and I unwound with a couple of glasses every night when I got home. I never missed a day of work and thought I was doing just fine, and I really enjoyed my chardonnay. I don't care for red wine...if I had even half a glass, it usually gave me diarrhea. Was never a "cocktail" drinker either because of the sugar content.
I did read in several health magazines that drinking more than a few glasses of wine a week could up one's risk of breast cancer. Since there was no history of BC in my family, I didn't worry about it. Incidentally, my mom did NOT drink at all, and she died from soft tissue sarcoma. My philosophy now is that you're gonna get what you're gonna get. Someone posted earlier that even slender, fit, tea-totaling vegans get BC, so go figure.
Since I was Dx'd with Stage IV from the get go, I decided to clean up my act. I stopped drinking as soon as I received the Dx, and I immediately lost FIFTEEN pounds without even trying! That tells you something about the calorie content in wine. I haven't missed it a bit. Of course, since I'm Stage IV with extensive metastases to my bones and internal organs, I've been forced to take an "early" retirement. That has reduced my stress level tremendously, and I don't need to have a glass of wine to unwind these days. When my DH and I go out for dinner, I do however take a taste/sip of his wine. A sip or two won't hurt me, especially on my "off chemo cycle" week.
I'm not anal retentive about it...a dear friend came over and cooked a wonderful dinner, and she brought a lovely chardonnay. I had about 3 ounces, not a full 6 ounce glass, and that's all I had. My birthday is in a couple of months, and when DH and I go out, I will have a glass (and probably won't finish it), and I won't feel bad about it.
I have mets in my liver, so I figure I shouldn't stress out my liver any more than I have to. It already has to process my oral chemo and pain meds.
I won't judge anyone. It's all about quality of life. If you want to have a few drinks each week, and your MO says it's ok, go ahead. On another note, I read somewhere that women on chemo might do well to have an occasional glass of red wine to stimulate their appetites. As for me, I'm trying to keep the pounds that I've lost off, and some chemos and aromatase inhibitors actually make you gain weight. So for now, no glasses of wine for me.
All my best to you all,
Lita
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I wouldn't worry too much about the wine you drink. If they knew what caused cancer we'd have a cure.
I agree a lot of calories in alcohol though.
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I switched to non-alcoholic beer . The good ones.
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I never drank much but I have almost completely stopped since my bc diagnosis 2 years ago. For one thing, I don't need the extra calories in alcoholic drinks. Now that I take Femara, I have enough trouble keeping my weight constant even with daily rigorous exercise and watching what I eat. I will drink champagne at my niece's wedding later this year but I do not drink regularly anymore.
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I did not drink much during Chemo. The advise of my MO was not to drink of the actual day of chemo. He had an MD friend who always went directly home from chemo & had two gin & tonics. But I believe in the moderation theory also. I have a gin & tonic several nights a week. The other nights I have a glass of red wine. So maybe I have one drink on 6 nights of the week.
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I don't drink on Xeloda weeks, but I will have a glass or two once or twice during my off weeks. I'm stage 4, so I might as well enjoy it while I can...but not go crazy with it.
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Amapola, a couple of drinks a week shouldn't hurt. A couple of drinks a day...not so good.
Io sono Italiana, and I'd have to turn in my membership to il club Italiano if I had to give up il vino tambien.
Lita
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the french give up cheese. many of us give up coffee, I gave up all alcoholic drinks including beer pretty much when I became a buddhist 1964+/- with several falling offs. none except gargle with brandy when coming down with a cold for nearly 9 years now. gary null says even one alcoholic drink is extremely toxic and there's lots more reservitrol in dark seedy grapes than in red wine
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Ah, Abigail, for some of us a life without a little wine and champagne is no life at all 😉.
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I'm with Lita on this one. My GP says alcohol in moderation is fine, likely because she likes a daily glass of wine
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And I understand it's more critical if you're ER+
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I drink as much wine as I wish as often as I wish. I also lost 50 lbs. exercise 50 minutes per day and eat as healthy as a horse. I consider three out of four a great start. We do not focus on being overweight or not exercising as much of a risk factor, but it is. It is easy for me to eat healthy and exercise, but not so much to stop drinking wine as that is my life style. We choose what works for us and what is easiest quite frankly. We cannot be super human and so we should not even try. If it is easy to not drink alcohol for you, then don't.. If you do not drink at all, then do not start. But do what you can to be as healthy as you can and accept being fallible and human. Only women would put this much pressure and guilt on ourselves for everything we do not do perfectly. So be ok with your body size, enjoy that treat and glass of wine and walk with your dog or grandchild, but most importantly, be as happy and content as you can be. We deserve this after all we have been through. love to all
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I was pretty much an alcoholic many years ago living in spain where the water wasn't drinkable really, I drank a liter of spanish brandy at night
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I stopped drinking more than two beers a day when I married a good wife ( first one was crazy) and have even stopped that some time ago. with all the different prescriptions I take, who knows what interactions might be happening with alcohol? diabetes, congestive heart failure ( improving) breast cancer and now lymphedema all trying to kill me, I don't need to add alcohol to the drug mix. sometimes all it takes to quit drinking is a divorce.
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Madrid winter 1961/2. franco's madrid. in a pretty newish but the fixtures were very old, apt. water heated for the bath with wood? never did learn how to do that, used the public baths.
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My PCP says that for most patients who aren't teetotalers, especially those at high cardiovascular risk, he recommends 1-2 glasses of red wine (only 1 for women) per day. For me, he says 3 glasses (5 oz. per) is fine, but he'd rather see me have 5 3-oz. glasses (not all on the same day) instead to keep up blood levels of resveratrol due to a family history of CV disease. (Grapes are a high-glycemic-index fruit due to their sugar content, which is lessened dramatically when fermented).
But I know of no doctors who would advise a teetotaler to take up wine drinking, even though heart disease risk is lower among those who have a daily glass of red than among teetotalers. (Most teetotalers abstain for a good reason, be it faith-based, liver disease, diabetes, medication contraindicaction, obesity prevention, or—especially—because of a history of substance abuse, either their own or someone close to them who has gotten into trouble from alcohol).
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My aunt stopped drinking Alcohol after she came to know tht she is facing with breast cancer. Doctors said,Alcohol, kills age by damaging Liver.. So, she stopped.
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TB90 I am with you. I am 74, am told I look 10 years younger , eat healthy, exercise , eat little sugar,and drink wine or gin and diet tonic every night.
No one is going to live forever😎
Tired of people who do not drink trying to make us feel guilty.
Actually obesity is the biggest cause of fatty liver and also causes elevated estrogen levels
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My BC is strongly ER positive, so I gave up my beloved wine, tequila and mezcal, cold turkey. But I added marijuana.
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My BC is strongly ER positive, too. But since I was diagnosed right from the start with Stage IV, I still have a glass of wine once in a while when I'm NOT on a cycle taking my chemo pills.
I figure, s*^t, I'm already Stage IV, what's the worse that can happen to me now? I get Stage IV and die????
I'm already there, so I might as well enjoy a glass with friends while I still have a few more months (or hopefully a COUPLE more years) left.
What I REALLY miss is sushi! Being constantly in treatment (and unfortunately I will be until I die) I can't eat anything RAW. Living in California, Sushi is everywhere, and I pretty much grew up on it: Hamachi, Maguro, Hotategai, Saba, etc.
Ah well, those were the days....
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My MO told me that 2 glasses of wine a week was fine so I'm trying to stick to that. During chemo, I didn't have a drop and really didn't feel like it. Even now, 6 weeks PFC and 10 treatments into radiation, I still don't really enjoy a glass of wine as much. My taste buds are still not back to normal.....
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Lita, not all sushi is made with raw fish (in fact, what makes it “sushi” is the vinegared rice). Shrimp, octopus, giant clam/geoduck, anago or unagi (eel), and tamago (omelet) are all cooked and then chilled before being placed atop the sushi rice. There are also various pickled veggies from which sushi can be made; and kappa maki (cucumber rolls) and California maki (surimi or crabmeat—neither of them raw—cucumber & avocado) don’t have raw fish. I believe there’s also inari, which is tofu deep-fried and slit to make a pocket, and filled with sushi rice. And of course, wasabi and gari (the pickled ginger) are fine. My late mom gagged at the thought of raw fish, but she enjoyed all of the above kinds of sushi. And even the salmon in various sushi (rolls, nigiri, temaki), while raw, is first frozen and smoked—to kill parasites and other pathogens. To be safe, I’d lay off the salmon sushi until your immune system is back to normal, but the other cooked sushi are fine.
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Thanks Chi, but I don't care for most of the cooked stuff. I like what would be classified as sashimi...the RAW tuna, yellowtail, scallops, mackerel, etc. If I go out with my family nowadays I usually get the bento box cooked eel (unagi) over rice or a dinner piece of cooked salmon.
The other thing my MO warned about (she's Asian) is that you have to be aware that the sushi chefs don't necessarily WASH THEIR HANDS with soap in between making the nagiri (e.g. raw tuna over rice) and the cucumber rolls or other cooked varieties. They may also CUT the cooked rolls on the same cutting board surface that the raw fish is cut on. The parasites in raw fish are microscopic, and can live on unwashed cutting boards, etc. She said it's better not to take a chance. To be safe, order tempura or katsu that's prepared back in the kitchen, not by the chefs at the sushi bar.
By following her strict advice, I have never gotten sick since starting treatment 😉.
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Good points, Lita. Salmon teriyaki, miso soup, rice, noodles—all good. I, like you, prefer sashimi (especially if I’m on low-carb), but I didn’t get chemo. Nonetheless, I spurned raw stuff during the 3 weeks I underwent radiation, because I was told my immune system would not be at its strongest at the time. (Unfortunately, I followed each treatment with a visit to the pie shop, fro-yo parlor or patisserie en route home. Ultimately unwise, but delicious).
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I can't imagine not drinking alcohol. It may even be what helped cause my breast cancer, but I am reliant on it. I am eating healthier and exercising but am not ready to give up my 2 cocktails a day.
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I don't believe in denying myself anything, everything in moderation. I do my best most of the time also have the occasional lazy day, drink, cookie, whatever. I intend to enjoy and maximize the time I have left.
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Right ON!!!! Moderation is my watchword, not denial.
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No did not stop, didn't stop anything really. I agree moderation.
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If you think you drink too much, then you most likely do. Moderation is good, yet what if you can't stop drinking? That is the crux of this honest brave post, for me at least. If all the recent reports that risk that alcohol represents for breast cancer has gotten your attention to where you personally feel your drinking is out of control, over the top, then stopping drinking is the best way forward. For help, try Alcoholics Anonymous, it works. Here are two links to click for your location: http://www.englishaainchile.cl/ and http://www.alcoholicosanonimoschile.cl/ All my best to you Daniela, x
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Everything in moderation. I don't believe in abstinence. We all know people who lived a healthy lifestyle even doing without sugar and alcohol, don't smoke and exercise constantly and still got breast cancer. Doctors have no real clue why we all drew the unlucky card.
My SIL drinks wine fairly regularly. She's not a sugar baby like me but she does eat more overall than I do. I don't think she exercises regularly either.
There are other health problems from too much of anything. Diabetes, heart problems, etc. so I if you don't control your "bad" habits you might be facing other health issues. This isn't a revelation.
I don't drink that often and when I do is beer. My addiction is sugar. Trying to get a handle on that.
Diane
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