Holiday Health Update

Oh, this is so overdue! I know. I keep thinking about how I need to post an update, and then I don't. It's not because I don't want you all to know what's going on—there just isn't anything going on! Seriously. I just don't know what to say! But for you, I will figure it out.

Zometa update: I got the insurance to pay for it! Yay! Also, this year's studies came back showing it to be just as beneficial as we knew it would be, so my insistence on getting it is totally vindicated!

Um, context, right, sorry—recapping. It's a bone density drug that is also used to treat cancers which have spread to the bone (bone mets). Some preliminary studies also showed it having benefit in recurrence prevention for women with early stage breast cancer (me!). It was still being studied, but I looked at the data and read up and decided I thought it was a good idea for me (my doctor thought so too). But alas! Insurance would not pay, because it wasn't yet definitively shown to help! Woe and worry—it's very expensive! $1500 a treatment! I found some funding, and a some of you were very generous (thank you!) and I started getting the treatments. And now, I can get the treatments paid for (as it should have been all along) and we can all use our money for more fun things. Nothing like scraping and saving to have some really unpleasant poison run into your vein. Yuck.

Anyway, and then just this month more studies came back totally confirming that for people with my type of cancer it can indeed reduce recurrence by 46%, so I'm doing the right thing. Excellent.

This is good because I'm not really doing what I should be with the other drugs.

Hormonal drug treatment update: The standard of care for hormone+ early stage breast cancer (what I have), right now, is to do chemo and/or radiation and surgery followed by 5 years of anti-hormonal treatment. This is one of two types of pharmaceuticals—Aromatase Inhibitors, or Tamoxifen. AIs are currently considered the best, so that's what I was put on first. Alas, I cannot tolerate them because I am a sensitive delicate flower and my body hates drugs of any kind. I tried various different ones, but by the time I gave up I was taking one half a pill every three days and even with that tiny amount, I was having awful side effects.

So we moved onto Tamoxifen. Tamoxifen is special in that 15% of people lack an enzyme that metabolizes it, so if you're one of those people, it just does nothing at all. No point in taking it. I, friends, am one of those special people.

So, now I am taking something called Evista (Raloxifen), which is primarily (again) a bone density drug (I am really not going to have problems with osteoporosis, premature menopause notwithstanding), which is also used for recurrence prevention. It operates on the same mechanism as Tamoxifen, which is to occupy (#occupy?) the estrogen receptors so the bad estrogen can't get in there. The advantages for me of this approach (as opposed to the AIs which just wipe all the estrogen from the body) is that I don't have to suffer the side effects of not having estrogen as much, so that's nice. Though I still have a very low amount.

The disadvantages are that the reason it's not really used anymore is that it doesn't work as well as the others. And, oh yeah, I'm only on a half dose because that's all I can tolerate. So to sum up—the AIs work 15% better than the Tamoxifen. The Tamoxifen works 15% better than the Evista, and I'm only taking a half dose of the Evista. Sigh. On the bright side, though there's no way of knowing, I'm pretty sure my super sensitivity to drugs means a half dose is plenty. I'll be happy enough if I can continue to tolerate this one; it's early days yet, and after this there isn't really anything else. So fingers crossed.

About the Tamoxifen thing: If you aren't a breast cancer patient, you will never get tested for this enzyme that prevents absorption of this drug. What a shame! So interesting! Because it's not just this drug—I looked it up and there's this endless list of other things that we 15% of the population can't metabolize and I just would never have known. There are antibiotics, painkillers, all kinds of stuff on this list. Do opiate painkillers just give you a headache? Maybe it's because, like me, you are incapable of absorption! Fascinating stuff, people. Really. Definitely goes in the “we know so so little” file of medical treatments.

Anyway, that's about that for medical news. How's my life? Uneventful, and pleasant. I am feeling pretty well—so happy to be off those AIs. Ugh. I feel a lot better. I go to the gym and run, a lot, I read books, I spend too much time on the computer, I try to get outside and I cook a lot of vegetables. Seriously, it's one of my main activities. I, uh, I don't know! Things are good, that's all that matters. Hope you all are well too and Happy Holidays! XO

PS-- Am I leaving out anything interesting? Feel free to ask questions. The feedback people give me is that you would like updates, but I just don't know what to tell you... help me out here! Oh, here's one; yes I am in San Francisco. I am trying to get out of town more, but that's still not much--the majority of the time I am right here in my apartment in my city. Which is fine. So come on out and visit!

6 easy ways to not get cancer

I'm not a doctor or an expert, but this is something I've learned a lot about over the last couple of years. Before I was diagnosed, I thought I was really healthy and doing so so much good stuff to be proactive and so on...but now, looking back, I can't believe the things I did to my body, not even knowing. So yeah, I used to do all this stuff. But look where that got me! So don't be the fool I was, friends....

I haven't really bothered to source all this. Most of it is pretty uncontroversial and widely known. BPA bad, vegetables good. I threw in a couple links, but for the most part, if you think something is wrong, you can call me on it; but I'd prefer you just googled till you find the study I'm referencing cause that's what I'm gonna do if you try to say I don't know what I'm talking about. Like I said, I'm no doctor—but unless you are, or also have cancer, I can assure you that I've spent more time reading up on this stuff than you have. So take advantage of my many hours of reading and trying to find sources that didn't agree with these things, because I don't want them to be true any more than you do, and read on....

(Or you could just read this American Cancer Society page, but I already wrote this whole thing so you may as well read it. But you will notice it says a lot of the same things as me.)

Don't eat or drink out of plastic!

Especially don't store hot foods in plastic, or heat in Tupperware in the microwave, but even cold storage (like water bottles) is very bad. Most plastics contain BPA, a proven carcinogen and possibly one of the main culprits of the modern breast cancer epidemic. When I see people drinking water out of plastic bottles, I cringe and fight the urge to knock them out of their hands like a lit bomb. Can linings also are plastic, and contain BPA; acidic foods especially soak up the BPA, so if you stop buying only one thing in cans, make it tomatoes/ tomato sauce.

Canning jars and metal water bottles are totally great and easy to come by! (Though for other health reasons I would stay away from aluminum in choosing a metal container). Glass food storage containers are also becoming more and more common, though I would point out that most brands have BPA containing tops; I like to put them in the fridge till the food is cool before putting the lid on. I may be fooling myself that it makes a difference but it can't hurt.

Stop eating dairy.

Seriously. Right now. I am vegetarian, and if you really want to be as healthy as possible I personally think you should be too, but that is negotiable. It's possible to eat meat or eggs and still have a really healthy diet. But dairy is just plain terrible for you. It increases internal inflammation, which is implicated in all kinds of health problems, from chronic pain to diabetes, depression, allergies, intestinal disorders, and more; plus it compromises the health of your cells, significantly increasing the risk of cancer. Dairy is associated with numerous cancers (breast, ovarian, colon, and more), but most of all with prostate cancer (the #1 cancer affecting American men, with one in six being diagnosed at some point in their lives).

There are also great environmental benefits to veganism, and factory farming is cruel and awful. But even raw, organic, pastured, pet goat dairy is bad for you. Also, milk is not an efficient way of getting calcium or Vit D; the best way to do this with food is green vegetables.

Stay away from trans fats as much as possible.

Eating a lot of any kind of fat is bad for you, and you probably shouldn't. But especially bad are trans fats. The main source of trans fatty acids in the American diet is partially hydrogenated oils. Margarine, anything deep fried, most things fried from a restaurant, and many packaged foods (cookies, chips, pretzels, etc) are high sources of partially hydrogenated oils. Overheating good oils also causes them to become trans fats. One study showed consumption of high levels of trans fats raising the risk of breast cancer by 75%; whatever the numbers, no one out there is saying it's anything but bad for you. It's so bad that even the corporations aren't trying to whitewash it—it's just impossible. It's that bad for you.

Instead, use olive oil. And don't preheat the cooking pan. Easy and good for you. DO NOT use canola oil! See below.

Eat vegetables!

Even if you still do all of the terrible things above, you can still cut your risk of cancer by eating vegetables and fruits. A quote; “...for most cancer(s), persons with low fruit and vegetable intake (at least the lower one-fourth of the population) experience about twice the risk of cancer compared with those with high intake....” What more do you need to know?!

A link.

Vegetables are amazing. I mean, I always knew they were good for you; everyone knows that, right? But the more I learn the more I am blown away by the incredibleness of the plant world. I don't like to have such a human-centric view of the world, but it's hard not to feel like the world was put together with our best possible health in mind when you learn about how every single plant out there is somehow amazing for us, specifically, in it's own different way. Even the most boring or random seeming vegetables have amazing properties (parsley? radishes? artichokes? you betcha!) So whatever you like, eat that! Lots of it!

For those of you living somewhere cold, or who are in a hurry—frozen veggies are a great alternative. They retain a lot of the beneficial anti-oxidants. Canned, not so much, plus see above re: dangers of cans. Organic vegetables are best, but the benefits of eating veggies are greater than the risks of pesticide consumption (except in the case of GMOs! see below), so better to eat the veggies than to hold out for organic.

But....don't eat GMO plants!

Genetically modified foods are not safe. The fact that they are modified makes them unsafe, increasing risk of allergic reaction and, as studies are now showing, possibly causing organ failure; but on top of that, what they modify them for, most often, is for the plants to be able to withstand higher loads of pesticides and herbicides without dying. So a GMO vegetable, or bean, or whatever, often has as much as five times the load of carcinogenic chemicals as a normal non-organic item (or in the case of soy, even higher levels). Things that, if they aren't organic, are always going to be GMO in the US—potatoes, corn, soy, tomatoes, and canola oil (I don't know if there's such a thing as organic canola oil, but if so, stay away from that too. Canola oil is no good!). Pretty much every junk food is all GMO. Potato chips, anything with corn syrup, and commercial tomato sauce, tofu from a cheap chinese food place. If you can't stop eating junk food, at least stop bringing home GMO veggies and cooking them into your healthy meals!

And finally, exercise.

To really get the full cancer fighting benefit of being active you would need to do at least 30 minutes of heart rate increasing activity a day. If you ride your bike around somewhere flat all the time, it doesn't count. You have to actually get sweaty and out of breath. Ideally, 45-60 minutes, five days a week. But anything is better than nothing—even a little walking around is shown to be beneficial so do whatever you can! But if you can get out there and run around or go swimming or something... that's the best. Also it makes you feel really good.

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So, I may be wrong, but I feel like I know what you're thinking. This is too much, I can't do all this stuff! What am I supposed to eat? How can I live my life? But it isn't that bad. You don't have to change everything about your life to make improvements. Just do a little. Get some glass jars and start using them instead of tupperware. Walk somewhere instead of taking the bus, Take the stairs instead of the elevator. Cook more simple meals for yourself (a whole grain—rice, whatever—a vegetable or two, and a bean of some kind—bean salad? Black beans? Lentils? Tada! It's a meal.) or just add a vegetable to whatever crappy thing you're eating. If you only do one thing, make it vegetable eating! Or exercising.

And if you already do all this and are ready for the advanced stuff, one last, unpopular, item....

Alcohol is bad for you.

I'm sorry. No one wants to hear it, and everyone just clings to the occasional study showing that wine reduces risk of heart disease or whatever. But there it is. Let me tell you about those studies the evening news is always reporting on. They do studies on, say, the cell longevity promoting properties in wine in an effort to find something they can synthesize into the new miracle drug. Anytime they do a study on a food or whatever, generally, it's a pharmaceutical company trying to find a way to make a buck. It's not about the food or wine itself, because that isn't something that can be patented so they don't care. Anyway, so they find something, and release a preliminary finding kind of thing, as a way of saying, buy our stock! We're about to find the secret to eternal youth!

But the wine itself doesn't do the things the study promises; they're speculating that an incredibly concentrated version of a chemical found in the wine would do that, under the right circumstances. To get that benefit, you would have to drink something like six or seven bottles of wine a day. Which would, of course, KILL YOU, because alcohol is bad for you! Sorry, but there you have it. Study after study has shown increased consumption of any kind of alcoholic beverage to be directly correlated with increased risk of many different kinds of cancers, especially hormone driven cancers.

If there's one thing on this page I know about, it's this. I personally read all the studies and pored over them for loopholes (a common practice in the Breast Cancer survivor world by the way—not just poring over studies for loopholes, but specifically the alcohol ones); the closest anyone has been able to come is an Australian study showing a slightly less elevated risk in people with high folate levels (obtained by eating lots of vegetables). But the truth is this; anything over three drinks a week is a huge risk factor and even that is iffy if you have a family history. I know everyone is going to do what they're going to do, and I know that what people want to do is keep right on drinking; but you deserve to know.

Sorry. I mean, I really am. I like being able to drink, a lot. It sucks. But there you have it.