Just The Facts

Sorry I've been MIA (I love you SoCal - I'll call soon!). Between the IVs, the homemade sulforaphane pills 6-8 times a day, researching the top experts on high dose IVs and dendritic cell therapy clinics, trying to keep up with exercise, corresponding with clinicians, and experts - like my friends who have beaten their brain cancer, etc., my head ends up spinning, and by the end of the day I fall into bed late at night, exhausted. Some days, like Thursday, I'll lose the fight with discomfort after hours of restless sleep, run to the bathroom and lose the homemade sulforaphane pills from both orifices. Yep, I know, it's disgusting, but sometimes it happens. The amount of pills that I'm ingesting, are very tough on my body.

I have a lot to say, and wish I had the energy and time to do a post every day, but I keep finding myself needing to research my current protocols to verify that I'm getting the proper treatment. I have to double check the reputations of my doctors, and the validity of their recommendations. I don't trust other people to have my best interest at heart - medical professionals anyway. I've been burned already, and I have to make sure that I'm getting the treatments that I'm paying for. Long story.

I am completely overwhelmed trying to verify things that I'm using in my protocol. For example, there is an internet article stating that high dose vitamin C can spread astrocytomas. I can't find the research to back it up though. In fact, I've found a researcher from Kansas University Medical Center who seems to be the leading expert on the subject and has the complete opposite opinion - with facts to back it up. She uses high dose vitamin C on all of her cancer patients, even when they're going through chemo or radiation. She has the research and facts to prove that it causes hydrogen peroxide, a pro-oxidant as apposed to an antioxidant which occurs in a low dose of vitamin C. Hydrogen peroxide in the brain alkalizes the tissues making the environment inhospitable - cancer hates oxygen, that's why exercise, meditation, and deep breathing are so beneficial). Anyway, everything is incredibly complicated, and I've learned quite a lot, but I still have so much to learn. The more that I find, the more that I have to research. For example, it's not good enough to just take 75 grams of high dose vitamin C, you also have to figure out what's being mixed in the solution, you need to know how long it takes to administer (you want it to take a certain amount of time, the faster it goes in the higher the dose it becomes or something like that - it's all about the number of drips per second). Anyway, it's incredibly over my head and I need to figure it out to make sure that I'm following the protocol that Dr Drisko uses. She's the KU genius curing cancers with this stuff. I want what the genius recommends. Duh :)

As for my curcumin IV, according to some friends who understand how to calculate body weight, and the amount in my IV bag, my brain is only getting 1 micromole. For this therapy to be effective I need to be getting much more than that, like ideally, 25 micromoles. So, now I need to talk to my doctor and see what the deal is. Are they trying to administer enough to get a good kill rate (as in, killing the cancer)? Are they being scientific or are they going by trial and error. It's frustrating. I have to double check all of their work. Sorry if I sound like a brat. I don't want to be a brat. I don't want to be difficult, and truthfully, I'm always nice to the doctors, but behind their backs I get exhausted and frustrated. I realize that they're all human and that they're doing what they think is best, but the problem is that they don't seem to be following proven science. They're going more by intuition, which I realize has a place in medicine, but I need facts. I want to copy people who have already beaten their cancer. If it takes 25 micromoles to effectively kill astrocytomas in my brain, I want 25 micromoles. It would be horrible if I was paying an arm and a leg, and then my knees and teeth, thinking that my treatment is killing little Hermie, when actually he is thriving. We have to be relentless about every aspect of these treatments, and research the crap out of them.

On a much more fun note, check out the card that my blog buddy Ann sent. Totally awesome!! Thank you Ann, for the card, thank you for purchasing Hope, and for giving ME hope. I appreciate it so very much!!

Fighting cancer is incredibly exhausting, mentally, emotionally, physically and spiritually. Although I'm pretty pooped, I believe that the energy that I'm expending is giving me great results. I have to pick between various things, it's a balance, because I can't do everything. I can't accomplish it all, but I know I'm headed in the right direction.

Hard Work & Healthy Distractions

Danny is going to kill me. I was supposed to tell my friends at the retirement home that I need to take a couple of weeks off from volunteering. Dan's worried that I'm overdoing it, and he wants me to focus on getting healthy. He believes that I need to focus solely on my new protocol, but while I was painting Margaret, Elizabeth, and Ruth's nails, I realized I just can't walk away. These wonderful women are so fun to be around. They keep me laughing, or at other times, we're just quiet. Volunteering feels like the only time that I'm not focusing on just me. It's wonderful helping someone with their walker, or opening a door. I love serving them juice, or painting their nails. They give me a reason to get out of the house every Tuesday morning, whether it's sunny or pouring rain. I'm afraid, that if I can't volunteer, I'll get depressed. I'm pretty terrified these days, and I need distractions. I need to help others. I need my life to not be just about me.

Yesterday was my first high dose vitamin C treatment. On Thursday, I'll return for IV curcumin and resveratrol. I'm going to be alternating those two IVs twice a week for quite some time. Unfortunately, the treatments are not covered by insurance. So, thank you to everyone who has donated money to help heal me! Thank you to Matt & AJ for Movember For Jess, and to those who have donated to the Islanders Bank account in Friday Harbor. Of course, thank you for the girls who created, and maintained the Hope for Jess website of my art work. Thank you to everyone who donated to any of the above fundraisers. You guys are AWESOME!! When it comes to medical care, hospitals are wonderful about payment plans, if need be, but when it comes to "alternative" medicine, you have to pay upfront. So, the money that has been donated to me in the past, has been incredibly helpful. I've used some to pay current medical bills, but then I got smart, and realized I needed to bank the donations for any kind of uncovered care. Because of your amazing donations, I'm getting full body, synergistic care that is not only healing my body, but also, directly targeting my cancer cells with a barrage of weapons. So, truly, thank you from the bottom of my heart!

Apparently, the high dose vitamin C, curcumin, and resveratrol IVs are synergistic with my low doses of artemisinin. They should all work together, along with my diet and supplements which have grown exponentially (shark liver oil, borage seed oil, fish oil, maitake, shiitake, lions mane, aloe vera jelly, boswellia, CoQ10, EGCG, D3 - I'm probably forgetting a couple) - and last but not least, it should all work with the sulforaphane chemo drink. I haven't been able to get started on the chemo drink, yet, unfortunately. I've ordered a yogurt maker, which should cook my chemo drink at exactly 100-110 degrees for several hours. It even has little cups, that sit on a tray. I'm pretty excited about it - the little cups on the tray will make it so that I can do a week's worth of drinks in one batch. Woop woop!! The shipment should arrive by the end of the week. Once that arrives, Hermie is going to FREAK. I'm pumped!!

Well.....I, mean, I'm pumped, and completely terrified. It's tough to keep my chin up and plow through everything, but I know that giving up would be ridiculous. I need to stay calm, ignore statistics about my cancer and effectiveness of the various treatments (30% success rate for one, 20% for another, etc.). I have to believe that these things that I'm doing are going to work together and heal my body. To put this much effort into living is risky because I would hate to be disappointed, but, of course, that's a horrible attitude to have. It's just not acceptable. That's not a winner's attitude. Maybe I need to do more deep breathing or something. Part of it could be that I feel disjointed from Hermie lately, I can't quite tell what's happening up there. I worry that he's morphing, which does tend to happen. Cancer cells don't like to die, and when they come into contact with things that threaten their livelihood, they like to adjust, change their dynamics and progress, so that the treatments are rendered ineffective. To outsmart the Hermies of this world, we have to keep the full frontal attack. It's exhausting, but it's the only way to win.