Juice Feast Days 3&4

I'm finding that consuming 3 quarts of juice in addition to my regular 4 oz. of daily wheatgrass is a lot to ingest. I left the house today & forgot to take my juices with me. I was gone for about 3 hours & drank water only. I did get hungry but I've yet to experience a nagging hunger. When I got home I drank 12 oz & that was it for the day. I'm not the slightest bit hungry & I still have a quart of juice in the fridge.

The strangest thing I've experienced in these 4 days is the massive amounts of mucus that my body is expelling, mostly from my left nostril. (Sorry if that's too graphic, but there will undoubtedly be alot more of that as I document this cleanse). It's as if there's an endless reservoir in my ear canal trying to find its way out. Today I used the neti pot which helped things along, & just when I thought I was through blowing my nose, my right nostril started releasing. I didn't even know that my ears were blocked, but I can feel them open & then block-up again, so there's apparently more to come.

Just as the neti pot helped me eliminate, I've also been doing enemas as part of the juice feasting protocol. I can't say that they're as productive however. Daily enemas are recommended during the first week only, then less often as I start taking cascara sagrada, an herbal laxative to keep things moving out.

I'm just about out of vegetables & will have to re-stock tomorrow, less than 1 week into the cleanse. I think even more challenging than giving up solid foods for so long will be keeping enough produce on hand. I'll just have to plan well & I'm sure I'll get my groove & it'll go smoothly - at least if these first 4 days are any indication.

Juice Feasting, Days 1&2

Wow, I can't believe how long it's been since I last posted. Now is a good time to resume blogging since I started a juice feast yesterday and plan to document the experience.

I've never made more than 7 or 8 juices in one day before - and that was when I was juicing a lot. On this juice feast I'll have 3 or 4 quarts of freshly made juice everyday for as long as I can manage, up to 92 days. I plan to go the distance. This is beyond any cleanse I've ever attempted in the past and should take me through some pretty serious healing and rebuilding.

The longstanding problem with my dry, gritty, sunken eyes is a clue that something is out of balance and I believe the juice feast will help my body deal with that issue once and for all. A couple of weeks ago I started taking cod liver oil because of its Vit A content and its healthy fatty acids (DHA & EPA)- all good nourishment for my eyes. It also has Vit D and due to my past deficiency I plan to continue taking this oil while juice feasting, although it's not part of the recommended protocol.

I've thought about doing the juice feast for more than 2 years and now the timing is right and I'm inspired and motivated. So, no solid foods - except for bee pollen - for 3 months! I'll also continue with 2 teaspoons of cod liver oil, and supplement with a few other things that are detailed on the juicefeasters website. I started yesterday and had no problems whatsoever. By evening I was hungry and tired so went to bed early. Today was a breeze. I haven't had more than 3 quarts and that seems to be enough for me. As I continue, I'll have more juice if I feel weak or get too hungry. So far so good.

An Overview of Healing - Part II

The greatest success of my natural healing journey is obviously the reversal of stage IV metastatic breast cancer. The cancer was the result of imbalances within my internal terrain and while I'm ecstatic with how far I've come to correct those imbalances I still have plenty of work to do.

My body is still rebuilding and I'm helping it along with supplements for a variety of deficiencies. Last year I had mercury amalgam fillings removed from my mouth. These fillings were more than 25 years old and I believe the vapors they emitted contributed to my body's toxicity and inability to absorb all the nutrients from my food, resulting in mineral deficiencies. Simple pH testing revealed an acidic environment. This has been corrected & my morning pH test is consistently at 6.8 - 7.0, which indicates an alkaline body.

The supplements I take are NatureThroid for an underactive thyroid; Vitamin D for a severe deficiency; Lugol's solution for an iodine deficiency; B-12 injections twice weekly; MSM to fight inflamation; silica to strengthen my weak nails and ionic trace minerals added to my distilled water. I take these consistently and this may change as my regimen has evolved quite a lot over the past few years. Eventually I intend to get everything I need from my food, once my body has rebuilt to that point.

The most preplexing health issue remains the condition of my eyes. They are still chronically dry, itchy and a bit sunken-in. I wear two pairs of sunglasses on bright days because I simply can't bear the light hitting my eyes. It seems the cause is the small nodules inside my lower lids which have clogged my oil glands. There has been some minor improvement but I still have a ways to go. I've been taking the MSM for about two months or so to help reduce the inflamation.

In this picture you can see the puffiness in my lower lids and how my eyes are sunken-in.

As for my energy and overall sense of well being I have no complaints whatsoever. I feel extremely fortunate to have such health and happiness. Of course there are days when I'm "off" - especially when I'm working too much and sleeping too little, but most days I feel what I would call euphoria - completely content and vibrant. Imagine what I'll be like when my eyes have returned to normal and my deficiencies have been met! Wow, I'm excited just thinking about it! So I'll keep at it and I'll continue to post periodic updates.

An Overview of Healing

This post is in response to a comment left by Amanda who requested that I give a summary of my healing journey, including the ups and downs, over the past two years. It's been quite a trip and it's not over yet, even though I've been cancer-free since January 2008. As I've achieved a greater state of health I've become more in-tune with the needs of my body and I have a better understanding of the connection between my physical and spiritual well-being. This journey is not a temporary phase of my life, as I once thought it would be, but rather a lifetime committment to reach my greatest potential on all levels of body, mind and spirit. This opportunity wouldn't have presented itself had I not been diagnosed with cancer and chosen an alternative natural path to healing.

I've remained faithful to a plant-based diet since early 2006 which I believe is the most important contributor to my healing. It wasn't always easy to stay the course but my desire to reverse the cancer kept me motivated. My exams at three-month intervals showed that the cancer had stabilized and the tumor markers were slowly declining. Despite all my good efforts there were a few times when the markers were unpredictable - up a little, then down a little on the next visit, then up again. That sometimes felt defeating, but I understood that this type of bloodwork isn't always reliable. It's more cause for concern when the tumor marker continuously rises by many points at a time. That didn't happen for me but I still sometimes had doubts, and that's when it was tough to remain patient and faithful to my protocol. Keeping a possitive outlook was at times tricky but it became much easier when my tumor markers started to plumet.

I didn't start to see an uninterrupted downward trend in my tumor markers until I started fasting one day each week and then switched to a high-raw diet. (80-100% raw). I believe this helped my body to detoxify on deeper levels than were possible with mostly cooked food. Fasting once a week wasn't easy but I felt it was important to periodically divert my body's energy from digestive tasks to deeper healing. With habitual practice fasting became easier. I've since gotten out of the habit of regular fasting but I keep trying.

It took a period of several months for me to switch to 100% raw. My first attempt at 30 days raw was a huge struggle. I felt deprived mainly because I missed the grains. I continued to research, learning more about how to prepare raw foods, what to have on hand, etc. and in early 2008, after several months of being high-raw, I transitioned to 100%. It's now my preferred way of eating.

Here's a picture of the residual nodules on my neck that was taken about a year ago.







...and this was just a few weeks ago.


It's hard to tell if there's much change since the lighting is different.
These nodules may be scar tissue, I'm not sure. They were noticeably larger and brighter pink when the cancer was still active and spreading. This is about all that's left and they're stubborn. I've tried therapeutic doses of enzymes, daily infrared sauna sessions, and countless other attempts to dissolve them, but they're not yet ready to budge. They are a reminder to me that my body has other important rebuilding work to do and will get to these later. Stay tuned for my next post when I'll write more about raw foods, my dry eyes and supplements.

Cleanse Day Eight & Done

I've decided to end this "cleanse" after today because it just doesn't feel like I'm accomplishing much cleansing. My eyes felt great for a couple of days but are back to the same old dry, gritty, sensitive state. I've been on fruits and vegetables only, with no added fats. I've also been resting and napping everyday which has been great, so there's something, but what I've come to realize is that with so much fruit in my diet I need to make more time for daily exercise to use up all that sugar. This type of cleanse for more than three days doesn't feel right for me so I'll end it today & attempt a stricter cleanse later this summer. I'm also trying to get more exercise into my daily regimen which is a goal as worthy as cleansing.

Today I saw my holistic doctor & had bloodwork and urine analysis to check among other things my thyroid, hormones, liver, & tumor markers. I'll post again when I get the results of those tests later this week.

Spring Cleanse 2009: Day 4

This is the easiest cleanse I've ever been on because all I'm doing is eliminating fat from my diet for ten days. I'm eating as many raw fruits,vegetables and fresh juices as I want. The bulk of my calories are from fruit which is much easier to digest than fat, so my body is getting a relative rest and plenty of energy. That break from digestive duty is allowing it to concentrate on other tasks such as healing. I don't know if this is coincidence or an effect of the cleanse but my eyes have been noticeably less dry and sensitive to light the past two days. I'm curious to see how long that will continue. No other noticeable changes in these four days. More later.

Spring Cleanse Resumed

I've decided to make this a relatively simple cleanse by eliminating all fat from my diet for the next ten days. This will give my body a bit of a digestive break while allowing it to easily assimilate the nutrients from all the fruits, vegetables and juices I'll be consuming. With less digestive work to do my body will be able to divert that energy to cleansing and healing.

I did great on Saturday with the Master Cleanse and yesterday was also a good day, although I had a little olive oil in a dish I made for a family function. Since I want this to be a completely fat-free cleanse I've decided to start over with today as day#1.

My day was simple with a wheatgrass juice first thing this morning, a green smoothie for breakfast and dinner, with fruit in between when I felt hungry. The bulk of my calories on this cleanse will come from fruit to keep me energized.

Rest is also an important part of my cleanse and today I took a three-hour nap! I haven't done that in years and it felt incredible. I may not be able to do that everyday but I've given this cleanse priority on my schedule for ten full days so I should be able to get in at least a few cat naps. All the benefits of my healing regimen are minimized without proper rest so I'm making it a goal to get adequate sleep consistently, not just during a cleanse. I'll post again in a day or two.