My Cancer Killing “Bag of Tricks”

What exactly did I DO to beat stage 4 cancer in less than three months??

That’s a GREAT QUESTION! And, you definitely aren’t alone in asking it. In fact, I am approached by people almost every day who want to know the secret weapon I used in my fight against aggressive breast cancer, and who are referring me to their friends and family so that I might help to guide them through this process. This is actually my primary reason for starting this blog…to SHARE with the world what I did, nutritionally and holistically, to support my traditional cancer treatment and BEAT this devastating disease.

So, here I am!

I am confident that I am meant to share this knowledge and help empower others to take the bull by the horns and be proactive in their own journeys. Traditional medicine alone is not enough, and there is so much more we can ALL do to help ensure our long and healthy lives, even after a devastating diagnosis.

Let me start by telling you the obvious…I am NOT a doctor, and I am, by no means, giving you any medical advice. I have a background as a health and fitness professional who is fanatic about clean eating and non-toxic living. Does this make me an expert in curing cancer? Absolutely not. BUT, I am a big researcher, and when I was faced with my own shocking cancer diagnosis, I decided I needed to DO SOMETHING to help make sure I would be around long enough to watch my girls grow up. I wasn’t willing to leave it entirely in the hands of my doctor. I needed to be an active participant in my quest for a cure. I needed to take back some of the control that cancer had taken away from me, and the best way I knew how to do that was to learn as much as I could about holistic cancer treatment, and find a way to incorporate it alongside the traditional treatment I would receive from my oncologist.

I’ll interject a small side note here…I did NOT want to go through traditional cancer treatment. The idea of pumping my veins full of toxic chemotherapy went against everything I believed. I resisted it, I cried about it, I argued with my doctor and my family about it. I wanted to cure myself holistically, and I really thought I could do it. BUT, as a 40-year-old mom with two young girls, the risk in making that decision was one I simply could not afford to take. If I tried it on my own and failed, it would be too late. I had aggressive, stage 4 cancer, and I knew I only had one shot at this thing, so I had to do absolutely everything I could.

After many tears and much deliberation, I decided that I would move forward with the traditional treatment, and supplement it with EVERYTHING I had been researching. When I spoke with my husband about this plan, he was…

a) RELIEVED that some sense had come over me and that I wasn’t planning on putting our family at risk by walking away from traditional treatment,

and

b) supportive of my new plan, but with some important food for thought. He cautioned me with the following; if I added in so many other cancer killing protocols, treatments, foods, etc., then how would I know which one was the magic bullet? How would I know which was the most effective? How would I know what worked and what didn’t?

The answer was simple; I didn’t care. As long as I was healed and healthy, I didn’t care if I knew exactly what got me there. Sure, it would be nice to be able to tell you precisely which of the items in my “bag of tricks” was the most powerful, or the most effective, but really, I NEEDED TO BE CURED, and I was willing to try just about anything in order to get there. If it meant that I would never know exactly what did it, then so be it. As I said to him that night, “I have done a ton of research, and have a long list of things I plan to do to make sure that I can get rid of this disease once and for all. I have only ONE shot at this thing, and I plan to throw ALL the spaghetti at the wall and see what sticks.” And that’s exactly what I did.

First and foremost, let me share my philosophy when it comes to nutrition. Food is our greatest form of medicine. Period. I believe this wholeheartedly, and knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that this was where I needed to start. I already followed an extremely healthy diet, focusing primarily on “clean” eating. My family is gluten, corn and {mostly} dairy free, so I already had a pretty good head start as far as nutrition was concerned. But I knew I would need to up my game here. The very first change I made (and I made it the moment I hung up the phone after my doctor shared the results of my biopsy, revealing that I did, in fact, have cancer), was to put myself on a very strict alkaline diet. Much more about this to come in a future post. And from there, the research, and the healing, began.

So, here it is…a list of everything in my bag of tricks. I thought I’d start with this list of everything I did during my battle, as a central point of reference, and will explain more about each one in greater very detail soon!

Overall Nutrition:
Alkaline diet
Ketogenic diet
Exogenous ketones

Protocols:
CBD/THC
Essential oils (Frankincense, Myrrh, Lemon, Orange)
Liver detox
High dose Vitamin C IV therapy

Superfoods:
Celery juice
Essiac Tea
Wheatgrass
Broccoli sprouts
Lemon
Turmeric
Apricot kernels
Garlic

Supplements:
Vitamin C
Turmeric
Wheatgrass
Mushrooms (reishi, cordyceps, turkey tail)
Spirulina

Mind/Body:
Mindset
Acupuncture
Reiki
Meditation
Prayer

So this is it…my list of magic bullets that helped me go from aggressive, stage 4 cancer to NED (no evidence of disease) in less than three months! My plan is to explain each of these items in great detail (what I did, why I did it, and why you may want to add these things into your life even if you DON’T have cancer) in future blog posts, so check back to this post often, as I will be linking to those detailed posts as soon as I am able to get them updated.

**Perfectionist’s side note: I’ve held off on sharing my blog for fear that I couldn’t release it until it was “finished,” but as each day passes, I find that I’m introduced to more and more people facing this battle, and I realize that I NEED to put this out there, finished or not. At the very least, this list can hopefully give you some direction for your OWN research. But don’t forget to check back often…as I DEFINITELY plan to add my own two cents to each of these topics 😉

And that brings me to my biggest piece of advice…DO YOUR RESEARCH! It doesn’t matter if you are facing a cancer diagnosis, another illness, are helping someone else through a difficult health journey, OR if you just want to learn more about how to keep yourself healthy, BE YOUR OWN HEALTH ADVOCATE. Sorry for all the caps, but I feel VERY strongly about this. Your health is your responsibility, and it is important to educate yourself on all the things you can do to be as healthy as possible. Doctors are awesome, and necessary, but they aren’t the be-all and end-all when it comes to your overall health. Start with educating yourself on nutrition, and go from there. Waiting until you have cancer, or another chronic or life threatening illness, in order to get your health in order, is not a great plan. You don’t want to be in a deadly situation before you start educating yourself. Start now. Learn what YOU can do to give yourself the best possible chance at a long and healthy life.

Trust me when I tell you, it’s no fun looking down the barrel of a gun. In my case, that gun was cancer, and when I found myself there, I was willing to do ANYTHING and EVERYTHING possible to heal myself. Luckily for me, I was already VERY passionate about health, and had a major leg up when it came to nutrition and healthy eating. Nonetheless, I made some pretty big changes, and I couldn’t help but think…the average person would have a VERY HARD time making such drastic changes overnight. Best to start the healthy changes right NOW. I absolutely hope and pray that you never find yourself in the situation I was in, but trust me when I tell you, the healthier you are NOW the more it will absolutely affect the outcome should you ever find yourself looking down the barrel of that same gun. Do research, make little nutritional changes every day, bring those changes home and implement them with your family, share what you learn with others…and most of all be diligent. Your health and your life are so much more fragile than you think, and you owe it to yourself to be as healthy as you can.

XOXO,
Malea