Losing Weight with Breast Cancer

First-- NO it is not your fault you got cancer..... the end.   Yes you produce more estrogen when you are heavier but estrogen does not CAUSE cancer...  if we knew what caused cancer we would be rich!  If that were true every over weight woman would get cancer - and that just doesn't happen.   Second- good for you for changing your diet!   I have been trying to lose weight since diagnosis and it is a struggle-- I think tamoxifen is not helping any!  I walk also - and if I see a treat that I just can't live without I have half of it ---  I normally would have eaten the whole thing-- but now half--- life is to short not to have a treat once in awhile...  just my thoughts!   Good luck and peace to you.  Tami

Hi, cakeisgreat ~
I have lost 30 pounds since my diagnosis.  I already ate a pretty healthy diet, but I ate late into the night and never excercised.  I stopped eating after 8:00pm, and the weight started coming off.  (Being nauseated during chemo probably helped a lot, too!)

I started walking three times a week about three weeks ago.  I haven't lost anymore weight, but I'm on Tamoxifen now so maybe this is going to be as good as it gets.  I don't know.  I'd like to lose more, so I may try walking more frequently once my stamina is built up a bit more.

I agree with Tami that life is too short to completely deprive ourselves of treats!

Good luck to you!
Artemis

I was diagnosed in January and after a few months of emotional eating (related to the dx), I reined myself in and started eating nothing but veggies, fruits, whole grains and lean proteins.  No processed food, no white flour, and as little sugar as possible (when I want a treat I make a smoothie).  Also, I eat every 3 hours 5 times a day and don't eat after 7pm and have protein with each meal and snack.  I'm on tamoxifen and have hypothyroid, so I assumed weight loss would be difficult becuase I've always had trouble losing weight.  So far I've lost about 15 pounds in 5 weeks and I haven't felt hungry or deprived once.  Long way of saying, you can do it!!  Trust me, if I can be successful losing weight just about anyone can.

Oh yeah, another motivation for me besides being healthy is I want an awesome bod to go with my new boobs!!  I plan on starting back to walking after the insane heat here goes away.  

Love your screen name - cake IS great!

I was diagnosed in January of 2008 and lost about 20 pounds from stress and anxiety - I'm a nervous puker, not eater. Then I lost a few more during chemo.

I've put about 13 back since I finished chemo in July 2008, and so I started WW a few weeks ago. I have a great motivator - my right boob is a silicone implant which does NOT grow when I put on weight, unlike my real left boob. So if I want to stay balanced. . . gotta watch what I eat.

Good luck to all of us trying to eat healthier and exercise more. And I agree with all of the above posters - NO, you did NOT cause yourself to get breast cancer!

I have at least 40lbs to loose and I too blamed my weight gain and lack of exercise,for my cancer DX.ut everyone is saying that its not true. I am now exercising regularly but have only lost a few lbs.I am finding it really hard.Hang in there cake you are not alone.

Hi Cake - I can really relate.  I would say I've been about 25-30 lbs overweight (sometimes more) almost my entire life.  I WAS a complete junk food addict.  I lived for candy and pizza.  If I was stressed at work, many times I would eat a whole theater-size box of candy.  I know people get upset if you blame your lifestyle for your cancer, but now I really feel like instead of living for junk food I could die from it.  I have always been very into thinking about and reading about nutrition, but I couldn't stick with healthy eating, and I always saw a diet as only a means to lose weight.  But now I feel like the stakes are higher. 

I have had a total attitude shift, and now I only want to eat healthy food.  When I got diagnosed I started trying to follow the advice in "Anti-cancer - A new way of life" and "Foods to fight cancer."  I told myself I would only eat healthy food, but once a week I could have an unhealthy meal of whatever I want.  At first I looked forward to the weekly pizza quite a bit, but now I can even skip that.  I recommend those two books all the time.  They make me feel like I CAN do something to improve my chances, and that makes me feel great.  I've lost about 12 lbs. since I started all this, and I haven't been at that weight for 10 years.  So I think it's totally possible - it's all in your outlook.

There is a pdf file that I'll try to find and post a link that lists a couple hundred studies on diet and exercise that show that it does impact survival. 

For me, I wasn't willing to do chemo because of the very low chance of benefit, but I am totally willing to fix my diet and give up the junk.  Some people say they want to choose the most aggressive surgery and chemo available, but this is my version of being aggressive.  I'm totally into juicing now - I have a huge glass of fresh veggie/fruit juice every day. 

You can do it - if you really believe in it, then it becomes easy.

Here's the link to the booklet - I found it elsewhere on the forum and it's been really helpful to me.

http://cancer.ucsf.edu/crc/nutrition_breast.pdf

Cake is great:

Your situations sounds very like mine.  I have lost 20 lbs since diagnosis, through exercise and healthy eating , but since I started on Arimidex 2 months ago, the scale has not budged  I stil need to lose  50 pounds, so I am frustrated and concerned because I know it can impact recurrence to be overweight.

I always ate a lot of fruits and vegetables,avoided red meat and alcohol, but was addicted to sweets. My workplace is covered iwith desserts and snacks full of transfats, corn syrup and very unhealthy things, but I found it very difficult to pass up all those chocolate chip cookies and muffins and candies that were just everywhere.  I definitely feel  eating that unhealthy junk contibuted to the cancer. or at least  created an imbalanced  environment in my body  that helped it flourish.

After having been diagnosed with BC, I now refuse to eat any of that junk, but  do allow myself an occasional high quality treat, but only after having had a healthy, balanced meal so my blood sugar doesn't spike.  I have read that surges of insulin are the real culprit, not the sugar itself.

I agree that the book "Anti-Cancer" is very inspiring and informative.  I also liked "The End of Overeating" and "In Defense of Food."  The food industry has been cooking up a toxic mix which it serves to us  disguised as "food" and this is what is causing a lot of our disease, more than the extra pounds.

I suggest avoiding processed foods completely.  Indulge in an occasional high quality treat where you know the ingredients are natural. 

I plan to ramp up the exercise, cut back even further on carbs and stop eating after 6pm. I hope that will start the weight loss ball rolling again. I really like what vivre said about thinking of food as medicine. And walking only 30minutes a day. 4 days a week, can cut your risk of recurrence by 2 to 3%, according to my oncologist.

Good luck! 

Oh sweety - don't you blame yourself!

There are some fantastic posts on this thread - what great info.

My tuppence worth - 10 mins on a treadmil at maximum incline burns off a lot of cals!

www.fitday.com is free, and I have been using it for calorie/exercise tracking for  ages and it does help.

Be an avid food label reader - it is so surprising how many foods have completely uneeded and unexpected sugar and worthless carbs.

Fruit juices are very high cal.  So not as healthy as we think.

10,000 steps per day really does do the trick, and no one should worry about having to start off at much lower than that.  Over a while, it becomes easy.  I think people may get put off because they think they have to be running miles and miles to have a positive effect - you don't.  By all means do so if you wan to, byt the 10k steps does a great job.

All best wishes -

I have lost 60 lbs since my BC diagnosis (20 of that I refer to as my mastectomy/chemo/herceptin diet as appetite loss was a side effort for me of the treatment).  The other 40 came off as a result of portion control (yes, a half cup of ice cream is OK) and exercise.

I have been plateaued on weight loss since March and still would like to lose about another 20-30 pounds.   I talked to my PCP last week and he has me on a doctor supervised system of food supplements and an appetite suppression drug. Of course his plan also involves exercise and diet but he agrees I have that part down pat, so I am hoping that the supplements give my metabolism a kick in the butt and gets my weight loss started again.

By the way I am postmenopausal so the excuse of menopause doesn't cut it for not losing weight.

I have about 35 pounds to lose.

 If you are interested in losing weight using calorie counts, and have an iPhone or iPod touch, a collegue just recommended a free iPod app called  "Lose it! ".  You can enter your daily weight, your loss plan, what you eat, what exercise you do, and it provides a daily calorie limit, depending on how fast you want to loose. 

I think its quite an app, and you can't beat the price!

Well, if being overweight causes cancer, what's my excuse? 

I've always been on the thin side, and it didn't protect me. There are so many carcinogens in our air, food and water, and we really don't know why some people are affected and others are not.

My 81 year old mother has been very overweight for the last 40 years, and she is pretty healthy in spite of it, and has been cancer free. Oh, and she has also been on estrogen (Premarin) since she was 35 and had a hysterectomy!  

Some of us are just "lucky" I think. 

Cake - Just want to weigh in on this (no pun intended).  Please don't blame yourself!  I have never really been too overweight (maybe 10lbs at most) and according to the stats when I went for my mammo last October I had a 13% chance of getting breast cancer to age 90.  Well surprise - at age 45 I had cancer.  Of the risk factors listed I guess my main one would be alcohol.  I do enjoy having a glass or two of wine and I'm not giving it up.  I can't believe that one thing caused this crappy thing to happen and I refuse to feel guilty about enjoying a glass (or two) orf wine.  I dropped 10lbs quick when I was diagnosed.  I felt so sick about the whole thing I couldn't eat.  Everyone I saw pointed out that I had lost weight.  I told them it's the cancer diet and I don't recommend it.  I wish you only the best on this rotten journey.

Sue

  I agree with those, here, who said that being fat doesn't CAUSE cancer. I used to weigh over 300+ lbs. for years. I finally lost weight, was down to 165 ish, and THEN they found my SMALL spot. So, I didn't get cancer while I was fat.

  I went through Chemo. first, and, with the steroids in the AC, I gained about 10 lbs. But, what with the nausea and all, I took that off, plus another 35 lbs. I have floated around the same weight through Radiation treatments, and since. I guess what really helped me, was that I made popsickles out of my protein drink. The cold is nice while it is so hot, and it is a way to get nutrition, even if you have naseau.

  Remember,  there are lots of us with stories like yours. And this site is a GREAT place to share.  Best wishes.

Dear Cakeisgreat,

Thank you for posting, and starting this thread.  I just found it, and I am so glad.  I also have been dealing with the irrational thought that I caused this because being overweight is my only risk factor.  It was so encouraging to hear the responses to your questions.

I joined WW on Dec. 31, 2008, and found the lump in my breast on Jan. 11, 2009.  I could easily have freaked out, and given up on weight loss.  Something inside said if this is something bad, you will be better able to fight it if you lose some weight.  I stayed on the program, and lost 30 pounds before my diagnosis in May.  I didn't lose at a fast rate, but slow and steady is better.  I have yo-yo dieted all of my life.  Now I just want to keep off what I have lost, and if I can get more off that would be great too.  I still have to go thru chemo, and then Tamox, so I just want to keep eating healthy and I think I will be fine.  I found a website, called Hungry Girl, and she has a couple of cookbooks that have lots of good healthy snack recipes, and her desserts are really good, even my kids love them.

Good Luck!!!!!!!!!!!! 

Susan