Early Stage Natural Girls!

Luna5

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Banba

Short question that may or may not have been adressed before:

Have you(if you are a hormone-positive gal)looked at removing items from your life containing phyto-estrogen? Not only food such as soy, pulses but  also alledgedly found in plastic et cetera.

Sherryc

Banda I have been trying to eliminate plastics and go more with glass for that reason

Merritmalloy

Banba - me too.  I go with glass as much as possible.  For soy, I've heard that natural soy (i.e. edamame, tofu, etc) is ok, but stay away from products that contain soy isolates.  Check out this video that explains why....(won't let me post link) go to YouTube and search Dr. Weil and soy isolate.

vivre

Merritt-If you cannot post a link, go to the little box in the blue line that has the T in it that says paste in plain text when you scroll over it, Paste it there and it will usually post.

MariannaLaFrance

Banda-

I try very hard to find products in glass at the store, but also I try to store my foods in glass containers as well. It's very difficult to find products in glass jars, which I find puzzling, since ecologically glass is very biodegradable and natural. Imagine if we used glass instead of plastics-- the world would be a much cleaner place. Glass can be crushed and re-used many times.

I wish the world would stop and think! 

althea

I've been phasing out plastic for a long time.  Water quality where I live is not good.  Tap water smells like a swimming pool.  Three summers ago I started collecting 4 liter glass jugs which are just right for holding a gallon of water.  They're 3 pounds empty, 12 pounds full.  I have my mom drinking it too. 

I highly recommend this for reasons beyond chemical-free water and better hydration.  Bone health benefits from lifting things.  Plus, I spent all afternoon yesterday pulling weeds.  Last year was another record breaking drought, so it's a novelty for weeds to actually come out of the ground.  So thankful for rain this year.  In years past, my first bout with weed pulling makes for a miserable day after.  This time, I'm not phased one bit.  yippee

Merritmalloy

Had appt with naturopath who rec some blood work.  Had it done via primary so ins would cover.  Got results today/  C reactive protein slightly elevated and Vitamin D well below nowmal levels.  Anyone else have these tests done or spoken to md about implications?

MariannaLaFrance

Merritt-

I had a similar test to CRP which is sedimentation rate, an indicator of inflammation in the body. While mine was not terribly elevated in 2010, I lowered it down to a 1 (excellent level).  I think it was a combination of my nutrition plan, taking curcumin (to alleviate inflammation), and exercise.  My doctor was very pleased with the results.

Vitamin D is just one thing that all BC patients should consider supplementing.  I took my levels from 31 ng/l to about 75 ng/l over 6 months with Carlson's Vitamin D drops. I took approximately 4,000 IU daily.  I also spent time in the sun every day (still do, when weather is warm) to keep my levels up.  Unfortunately, when I dropped Vitamin D last summer because I figured I was getting a lot of sun here in Texas, bicycling and running daily..... and my levels dropped down to 55.  So I guess I have to supplement, even when the sun is shining here. I am on a maintenance regimen of one drop daily (2000 IU) of the Carlsons. Haven't been tested, but I can attest to the power and energy that Vitamin D gives me. When I resumed taking Vitamin D in September after my "summer vacation", I had so much energy that people commented on it. I guess I was wearing people out!!!!  

MariannaLaFrance

Merritt- check out the Vitamin D Council website for what low Vitamin D levels mean and what you can do to alleviate that. Most docs are coming up to speed on the importance of Vitamin D, but you can do some reading on your own to see the benefits. I highly recommend Carlson's D drops, as the pills don't seem to work as well. Additionally, one needs to take Vitamin D3 as opposed to D2 to increase serum levels.

Merritmalloy

Thanks for the advice on vitamin D.  My count was 18 ng/Ml.  I'm guessing based on the scales I reviewed that this is far too low!  My CRP is .5.  Good right?

I am waiting for a call back from naturopath to discuss results, but sounds like Carlson's is a great start.

MariannaLaFrance

Merrit- keep us posted. I had such an energy surge once I started on Vitamin D. I felt 20 years younger once I started taking the supplement.... hope that you have good results, and would love to hear how you feel and do on the Vitamin D.

Kaara

Vitamin D made a big difference for me too...that and the BHRT which  I don't take anymore, but I still have some of my old energy left.  I'm hoping the tamoxifen doesn't drain the last bit of it out of me.

vivre

Keeping the vit D levels tested is a good idea. I try to keep mine about 80. I have tried all differnt brands. I found that the Carlson's drops just kept my numbers going up and down. I think the potency must diminish once the bottle is open, or they have poor quality control. I would go from 85 to 45. That is when I switched to Usana and have been able to keep my numbers high ever since.

Althea-if you have that much chlorine in your water, consider getting a filter for your shower head. I learned today that shower steam is highly concentrated chlorine. You are breathing in really toxic steam. In fact, the less steam your shower generates, the more likely your water is less contaminated. This really makes sense to me. I have noticed that since  I have been living in a home with my own well, that we filter really well, I have NO mold on my shower walls and the windows do not steam up much. And DH can stand in a shower for eons. He thinks he is in a car wash. Thankfully, the well also means we do not have to pay high water bills.

Merritmalloy

Kinda TMI - but has anyone experienced (and found solution for) very long periods?  Fir my last 3 cycles, I've gone past 2 weeks!  It started after my mx in Nov 11.  Coincidence.  Saw gyno who said everything seemed ok and it could just be my body in shock.  Saw naturopath who put me on chaste berry extract to get my pituitary to balance my hormones.  She believes it is a lack of progesterone.  She also rec something called dim.  She didnt have any in stock at my last visit.  I did some reading when I got home and I'm not sure about taking it. I like the idea of the chaste berry because everything I read says its perfectly safe.  Anyone else experience this?  Could it possibly be the result of my extreme vit D deficiency?

Luna5

Make sure if you are ER + that chaste berry isn't estrogenic.

sweetbean

Just wanted to weigh in, although I'm a little late.  Banba, plastic is not a phytoestrogen - it is a xenoestrogen.  Plants are phytoestrogens and everything that I have read about phytoestrogens is that organic, non-GMO phytoestrogens, such as soy, are beneficial for hormone positive women.  They actually work synergistically with hormone therapy by being just estrogenic enough to fool the cancer cells, but not estrogenic enough to feed it.  Dr. Block from the Block Institute is supportive of soy consumption for hormone positive women.  There is an article about it on blog at www.lifeovercancerblog.com.  Just search soy.

Xenoestrogens are estrogens from manmade sources and are very bad for hormone positive women.  They include chemicals like BPA, which not only mimic estrogen, they can make the cancer cells more aggressive and interfere with the action of Tamoxifen.   

Anonymous

I have to disagree about soy intake for estrogen positive BC

"The traditional soybean was quite different from the soybean as we know it today.

Glycine soja, the wild soybean, is found in northern, north-eastern and central China, adjacent areas of the former USSR, Korea, Taiwan and Japan. Glycine soja is the species of soybean that was consumed traditionally and is the ancestor of the modern cultivar, Glycine max.

The isoflavone content of Glycine max was first reported about 60 years ago, but it is impossible to know with certainty whether Glycine soja contained isoflavones. It is well established that Glycine max is, compositionally, quite different from Glycine soja. For example, Glycine max contains approximately 21.0% oil compared with 9.8% in Glycine soja; Glycine max also contains more protein. This is quite expected because Glycine max has been cultivated to have maximized economic potential.

It has also been shown that plants such as Glycine max produce phytoestrogens such as the soy isoflavones as a defense mechanism in response to pests. Increased disease resistance has been a consistent goal of soybean breeders and it is quite conceivable that this goal has served to increase the levels of isoflavones, and other naturally occurring toxins, in Glycine max.

It is also well established that different cultivars of Glycine max can contain widely variable levels of isoflavones. If this is so, then it is not implausible that the traditional Asian soy-bean, Glycine soja, contained quite low levels of isoflavones or perhaps none at all.

Therefore, a counter argument to the ADM claim of long and safe use could be that isoflavones have entered the human food chain only in relatively recent times. It has been the cultivation of Glycine max coupled with mass production technology and incorporation of soy protein into numerous foods that has resulted in these compounds being almost unavoidable in the human diet. This mass exposure has only occurred in the last 30 years. It is still undetermined whether isoflavones are safe.

It was the toxicity of dietary levels of isoflavones to animals that first raised the awareness of the scientific community to the fact that soy isoflavones were endocrine disrupters.

It is incorrect to state that there is no evidence of harmful effects of soy isoflavones on humans. In fact, there is mounting evidence that dietary levels of soy isoflavones cause thyroid disease and may increase the risk of breast cancer. 

With regard to breast cancer, Dees et al have shown that dietary concentrations of genistein may stimulate breast cells to enter the cell cycle; this finding led these authors to conclude that women should not consume soy products to prevent breast cancer. This work is consistent with an earlier report by Peirakis et al who expressed concern that women fed soy protein isolate have an increased incidence of epithelial hyperplasia. 

Also, the synergistic effects that soy isoflavones may induce, when combined with other xenoestrogens to which the human population are exposed, are beyond the scope of this document. However, there is a general thesis that, because of the potential for synergistic effects, human exposure to all endocrine disrupters, such as the soy isoflavones, urgently requires reduction."

http://www.westonaprice.org/soy-alert/soy-isoflavones-panacea-or-poison 

Anonymous

Hi there - jumping in with a video link I just watched, so impressed with all the info shared within 7 minutes.  Please pass it forward, this is life-saving info for so many.  Includes insurance info for those non-insured too.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1PLoCsztK1g&context=C31625edADOEgsToPDskJPmVdEkD8in7mfMcA9GDzh 

Merritmalloy

Thanks for the video link Essa - I wondered the same thing about core biopsy.   I asked surgeon after the fact how it didnt spread if it was dcis.  Wouldnt a biopsy open up the duct containing the cancer, allowing it to spread  She explained that those types of cancer cells do not spread.  Is that just dcis?  If I had something more invasive, I'd wonder!  I find it so frustrating the division between what informed people read and present to us with what tradtional med establishment dictates.  Why such a chasm?  I want to find it hard to believe that doctors arent informed, but there is so much conflicting nfo out there.

Kaara

The core biopsy thing has me worried.  Maybe that's why they insist on rads after surgery...even on the early stage cancers...to catch the cells that weren't removed from the core biopsy!  I had a stereotactic biopsy, which I guess is the same thing as core, and I refused rads.  So now I guess I have to worry about another possible cancer.  I'm having a thermogram next week which is three months from my surgery, and will alternate with mammograms thereafter.  If this does come back, I have learned a valuable lesson...no more core needle biopsy...just incisional.  Why aren't we being given these options by our BS's!

Merritmalloy

Kaara - I specifically asked my breast surgeon about thermography and she completely dismissed it as viable.  My very first mammo, years ago, found something suspicious.  I was given an ultrasound to rule out cancer.  They determined it was just thickened tissue.  To the point the woman made on the video, why mammo and not ultrasound - less radiation and seeming more detailed view of what's going on?

Sherryc

mammo's have always been worthless on me.  A waste of time.

Kaara

Merritmalloy:  My BS said the same. Convetional doctors have no use for thermography...why would they....usually they have an office or hospital full of mammography equipment that is bought and paid for, and they have big insurance on their side.  If I had relied on an US for my diagnosis nothing would have shown up...they found it on the mammo, but not on the US..twice one was done.  I am going to pay for the thermography out of my own pocket because I believe it detects suspicious areas years before a mammogram can.  I will still get the mammos, just alternating with thermo.  I need to stay on top of this since I didn't have rads.

vivre

I have had a half dozen therms in the past few years. I will never do another mammo. When you get regular therms, you can see changes in your breasts that mammos do not, long before they might become issues. Inflammation will show up as higher temperature, as will lots of vascular energy. Tumors need lots of blood to feed them, so you can see lots of vascular links forming on a therm. It gives me such peace of mind. We need to demand them so we can get the insurance codes back which were lobbied away by the mammo industry (back with pink bucks).

I was so mad at my surgeon when I went for my 1 year, armed with 3 therms. He would not even look at them! In fact, he spent the whole appt. lecturing me on why I needed to do a mammo and did not even do an exam so I got undressed and paid him big bucks for nothing. Needless to say, I have not gone back. He did a great job on the surgery, but I have learned to never again go to a doctor who refuses to see me as a person and not another standard case.

But his attitude was one reason I became an activist and  I will not be intimadated to back down.

Kaara

vivre:  I'm sure I will face the same thing when I go to my BS for my follow up app't.  I plan to take the results of the thermo with me.  I'm interested to see how mine will turn out, particularly the right breast because they never did an MRI on me to see if my other breast was clear.

Anonymous

The thermography is one I am committed to from now on, I plan on two or more a year to watch changes.  I will be able to watch for the changes that prove what I am doing is compatible to my case. The BS would have to use ultrasound and MRI, no mammos, no more, before surgery, if needed.  I will shop around this time, for certain, and would probably have cryoablation on a tumor, benign or malignant either way, just freeze it where it stands if it is unresponsive to the PawPaw and other stufff I am doing tthat I would hit it full foorce with if it showed up. 

As mentioned in my comment on the video, I did not have a core biopsy but my BS did not prepare for my surgery and left a positive margin.  I didn't think he could or would, he is sso respected, and he was so certain, but he did.  So the core biopsy is not the only way to have the cancer spread.  Then he wanted to do reexcision and/or a MX, I said no, I refused a core biopsy for this reason and you knew it, I asked for more tests prior to surgery since it had been two months from mammo, you did not, then you left the cancer and this was systemic from the beginning, so whittling me away is not going to stop it. Wish I had kept looking for my dreeam surgeon, but went on recommendations from everyone who liked this one. But, no, I never believed in core biopsy, always seemed to load the gun so to speak.  I told surgeon, we are not going to poke the bear (my tumor) so just get it out and leave as much of me intact as possible while getting it all out.

Vivre, am glad you walked, and am glad you are an activist, we need you.  i am going to be an activist for people with cancer who live by OWBs (outside wood boilers) that upset their hormonal balance and destroy their lives and health.

Kaara,  your intent to do this with alts and complementary is inspiring, has been from the first I started reading your posts.

Merritmalloy, yes, I was told the US is less invasive, but the digital - a true digital mammo is supposed to be less radiation that you get from the moon and stars (told that by xray tech at dentist last week) but I don't buy it.  My LPN soon to be a DR told me the US do not show the details of an US, and I don't buy that either.  Why oh why do they follow mammos w US if they don't show MORE detail? Like they say like yes there is something there and now like we are going to see what it like is.  Sooooooooooooooooooooooooo check w the US first..... !!!! and w the US they COULD if they only WOULDDDDddddddd check all the area, from thyroid and neck down to include and go under the breasts, in the arm pit, in the trunk breast area, all the nodes in the collarbone area that are not able to be squished in the mammo.

I hate to tell the pros how to run the tests but darn it.  No, they are not going to do it the way it makes sense to me, they know, so they do it their way, all of them and I WE are the ones ending up with cancer left behind, reexcisions, node involvement that could have been avoided, MX, more surgery, going under anethesia again and again, spending money on that instead of on supplements, naturo docs not covered by insurance, healing and getting new boobs or at least something more symetrical with the other side.

Okay, I'm okay.   I'm done for now.

But that video wa a godsend, I thank her for sharing so much in so little time. So inclusive!

Anonymous

Essa, what video?

Dianarose

My experience has been that the mammo's only show calcifications and DCIS and the MRI didn't show these, but found the spot that was CA. Now they are saying I have to have both. I don't know anything about thermography, but am going to research now. I hate it when you mention something that the doc's don't do and they quickly try to shut you down. I feel like I am just a money maker for them and the pharmaceutical companies.

Anonymous

Posted above, here again

"""""Hi there - jumping in with a video link I just watched, so impressed with all the info shared within 7 minutes. Please pass it forward, this is life-saving info for so many. Includes insurance info for those non-insured too.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1PLoCsztK1g&context=C31625edADOEgsToPDskJPmVdEkD8in7mfMcA9GDzh   """""

Enjoy