It has been a very VERY long time since I last posted. On one hand, it seems as though my world has kind of halted in it's tracks ... but in reality, it hasn't. Life does go on, but it will NOT allow it to go on without me. The past few months have been an intensive cocooning kind of phase for me. LOTS of introspection ... lots and lots of it. I go into these "cocoons" each time a life changing events happens to me.
During this cocoon time, I have been reading and researching, and listening to others, and I have learned a lot. A LOT. For the past 2 months I have been re-learning how to look at food, and nutrients, and exercise. I say "re-learning" because dude, I was pretty damned healthy before all of this happened. Lived a fairly vegetarian lifestyle, exercised, kept active, and this shit still caught up with me. Since I have already been through the months of "why me", I decided to think "why not me" and started taking apart my lifestyle bit by bit. What I learned was this...
1) toxins -- toxic people and toxic foods, out of my life. I have endured and ignored a certain constant toxicity level for many years. I may have ignored it in my mind, but my physical being, my body, and my brain were still subject to it. Stress, and negativity do a lot of damage to a body. Couple that with the toxins in the food I was inadvertently consuming ... ugh ... Organic meats, and severing all toxic relationships ... I will be holding no more toxic relationships with either anymore
2) balance -- balance in my emotional life, and nutritional life. I now plan what I eat every single day to keep my omega 3s and 6's in balance. I read somewhere that the typical American diet is WAY unbalanced when it comes to the types (qualities) of fats we consume. The omega 3's are sometimes 40 times lower than the omega 6's, and this leads to and perpetuates inflammation. Chronic inflammation leads to a host of diseases, including cancer. I am also thinking about taking up meditation. I need to quell the sore spots left by the toxic burns.
3) sugars -- the body can make the sugars it needs from the break down of the fats and etc we consume. When we constantly consume too much sugar (from refined flours, sugars etc) we spike our insulin, and push our bodies toward insulin resistance -- when cancer is active and growing rapidly, it feeds on these excess sugars in our bloodstream. Contrasts used in MRI's etc. are sugar (sucrose based) because areas of increased cellular activity take up the sugar more readily than the slower growing surrounding tissue. I now keep track of my daily Glycemic Load and keep it under 100.
4) Fats -- a recent study showed that people with my kind of cancer (the perfect trifecta, triple negative (borrowed from Jennifer)) showed that people who keep their total fat intake to 20% of their daily calories reduced recurrence by 40% or so. Additional exercise reduced it a further 45% ... 20% is NOT easy. Matter of fact, I have to aim for 15%, and then realistically, I will hit 20%.
These are changes that I can easily adapt to my life that will not only make my body a healthier body, but it all will make my life better for the future. I will on a daily basis be a healthier, happier, more balanced person after all of this.
As for knitting ...
At some point during all of this, by beautiful boxes of roving arrived from the Mill. I have not yet had the energy or inspiration to touch it. That makes me sad. I cannot wait to be back to my old self again. Knitting kind of fell to the way-side as well. I did finish my grandmothers sweater, and it was gorgeous. My Etsy shop has been doing well, and I need to sit down and make up some new markers, and earrings ... but once again, I have been feeling totally uninspired. I know a lot of this comes from the toll that the chemo is taking on my brain and body. Since I have only one more treatment, I will let this blah feeling sit here for one more week, but after that, I will be throwing open the windows and letting this chemical fog blow out!
Friday will be my last Taxol treatment. Then, a few weeks after that, my port will be removed possibly along with my ovaries. Then, a few weeks after that, radiation will start. The only thing out of that gory list I am looking forward to is removal of my port. I am so thankful to have had it, but I am even MORE grateful to see it go.
